Charmed: Rewitched
by Rosewyn
Summary: My take on how Charmed should have been after season 3. Prue is still alive. This isn't a Power of 4 story. Paige is included, just not in the way you think. Prue was my favorite so I decided to write this out. I hope you all like it. It was fun to write.
1. Prue Calling

Charmed: Rewitched.

Season 4 Episode 1

Prue Calling

Debris, shattered glass, and blood; failure. Shax had, once again, made his mark. Succeeding in more than what he was sent to do. The Halliwells lay, through the remains of what used to a wall of their manor, unconscious. While, on the other side, their innocent was dead. Dr. Grffis' body was hanging out their window; glass shards sticking through his body. An ominous breeze began to blow through the broken window of the manor, casting some air onto the bodies of Prue and Piper. Blood lay dripping onto the ground from the back of Prue's head and out of her ears. Piper's woulds appeared more serious; her face appearning completely broken with blood pouring out of her face profusely. How could things have gone so wrong?

And then, a faint moan escaped Prue's lips. The first one was subtle, and then it became louder. She struggled to open her eyes, a combination of pain and the blinding it light of sun didn't make it easier. She began breathing really hard; the pain her body was in began reaching her semi-conscious state and her moans then turned into a solid scream as she tried to sit up. She couldn't. The gash in the back of her head was excruciating, and she had a sinking feeling that if she moved any further, she would only go back into a comatose state, or even, die. She was able to turn her head slightly where she saw her sister and her wounds.

"Piper..?" she said faintly. She was able to lift her left hand and manuevered it the best she good to touch her sister's hand. "Piper!" she was nearly inaudible. Her voice cracking with the tears of her pain and the worry that her sister might be dead. "Piper, please wake up." Nothing. Her hand became stiff, with all of the blood loss it became very hard to control her movements; and it became increasingly difficult to stay conscious. She knew the only one who could help them. "Leo! Leo!" her voice was now hoarse, but he would be able to know it was her. Moments seemed like ages and he still didn't come. "Leo, please!" still nothing came, the bright blue and white lights that would usually appear before them was no where to be seen.

Tears began to run down her face more and all she could do was lay there. She remembered Shax bursting through the doors of the manor, knocking her and Piper away and appearing before their innocent, Dr. Griffis, ready to kill him. And then Prue pushed him out of the way of an oncoming blast and all she could remember after that was hitting the wall and then blacking out. Evidently, Piper was hit too. But where was Pheobe? Their sister, who she believed to be upstairs getting the vanquishing spell was no where to be found. Which only meant that Dr. Griffis was killed. Did that mean that Pheobe was too?

"Leo! Please if you can here me, LEO!" she couldn't even make sense of her own words before she felt her eye lids forcing themselves shut. Out of the corner of her eyes, a cascade of bright lights began to appear and solidify in a male form.

"Oh no!" he roared. Prue had already blacked out.

Moments later, she felt herself moan again, her pain - nearly all of it - lifted. More importantly, she heard Piper groan too, which meant they were okay. Prue's eyes opened and she saw Leo standing before them, looking both extremely afraid and relieved.

"What happened?" Piper bellowed, both frustrated and confused. She looked at her husband boldly and held out her hand for him to help her up.

"You almost died that's what happened!" Leo explained bluntly, helping Piper to her feet.

Piper then turned around helped Prue, who was still feeling extremely sore despite being completely healed of her gashes and bruises. "Yeah, noted. But where is Shax?" she demanded.

Leo hesitated before answering, "He's gone...but he's not your biggest concern right now." Prue and Piper looked at each other. And then, it dawned on them that Dr. Griffis wasn't in front of them and Phoebe was still missing.

"Uhh...Where's Phoebe? And --" Prue paused, turning to her right and gasped. "Oh my god. Leo! Leo!" she ran towards the broken window where their innocent's body lay with Piper and Leo quickly behind her. Prue tried to lift his body but he wouldn't budge. He was stuck on the glass. They needed to heal him. She lifted her hands in front of her and concentrated her power, slowly lifting him off of the glass shards and out of the window, setting him carefully on their dining room table behind her.

"Leo, can you heal him?" asked Piper who looked completely frantic.

"His heart is still beating..." He placed his hands over Dr. Griffis' body and golden luminescence shone from his finger tips, repairing the doctors body and healing him completely. Yet, he didn't wake up.

"Leo...he isn't a awake? Is he..."

"No Piper, he's unconscious. His body isn't used to being hit by demonic attacks like you guys are. He'll be out-cold for awhile." he explained. The three of them stood in silence before the previous notion that Phoebe wasn't with them became obvious.

"Uhh. Leo, where is Pheobe?" Prue asked, looking around making sure their sister wasn't also unconscious somewhere else.

"Here..." he began disdainfully. "Let me return him to his house, I'll put the memory eraser on him so he won't remember this. I'll be right back." He placed his hands on Dr. Griffis' body and together they took off in a shimmer of lights.

"But Leo, wait - ugh." Prue shook her head defeatedly and turned to her sister. "He could have at least answered our question first." her tone became frustrated.

"Yeah, that is odd..." Piper agreed. "Maybe we should look for her." as if thinking it before Piper said it, Prue took Piper's hand into hers and led her around the first level of their manor quickly, trying to find a trace of her.

"Phoebe?!" they both called in unison every few or so seconds. Once they realized she wasn't on the first floor, they ran up the stairs to the second and split up. Piper went to look in her own bedroom and the bathroom while Prue searched in her own bedroom as well as Phoebe's. Minutes later they met up and shook heads. Where was their sister?

"Okay this is wierd. She couldn't have just...disappeared." Prue deduced. "I mean," she began, leading Piper to the attic to check there. "When we got into the manor, she ran up here to find a vanquishing spell." Trying to make sense of it in her head, Piper interrupted her.

"Maybe she just didn't hear us yelling...and then Shax got her..." Piper folded her arms and began to allow fear of the possibility consume her.

The two sisters entered the attic and still there was no sign of their sister. The shock wasn't as intense as it was in the earlier floors. Surely by now Phoebe would have heard them if she was there. The Book of Shadow's however was still open. Prue and Piper walked over to it and it was open to a page about Shax which also contained his vanquish. A pen also lay next to it. Prue and Piper both knew that Phoebe was there and she wrote down the spell. But then, where was she?

"The pieces just down seem to fit..." Prue sighed, reading more about shax.

"What do you mean?" Piper asked.

"Well, Shax would never actually take a victim, it says here that The Source would only send him to kill and not leave a trail. With Phoebe missing, it leaves a trail." she explained.

Just then, Leo's orbs came flying through the window and form his appearance. A noticable emotion of hurt lingered in his eyes. Prue and Piper took notice to this immediately.

"Dr. Griffis is fine, I - "

"Leo, we're sure he is. What's wrong?" Piper demanded.

He didn't answer.

"Where's Phoebe, Leo?" Prue said, slamming shut the Book of Shadows and approaching him furiously.

"...She's in the Underworld." he hesitated. Prue and Pipers eyes widened in shock. They looked at each other in disbelief, without words and then looked back to Leo.

"Uhh, why would - why would she be there?!" Piper began to approach him as well.

"Look, a lot of things have happened. This reality that you're in right now, isn't what is was before."

"What does that mean?" Prue began shaking her head, angry that the exposition was still coming instead of concrete answers.

"Well," Leo began and walked over to the couch, Prue and Piper followed, and he sat down. They didn't. "Phoebe made a deal with The Source, the reset time. Now she's in the Underworld, and The Source has a plan for her, I fear he's just going to kill her."

There another few moments of silence. Piper and Prue didn't look at each other, but yet, at seperate spots, starring, thinking within themselves, trying to process the little information Leo gave them that didn't make any sense.

"Why would Phoebe do that?" Prue asked. Piper looked up at him.

"Because, in the other reality, before she made the deal, the same thing happened to you and Piper - Shax blasted you guys through a wall and Phoebe was there and fought him off while I healed you. And then you two ran after Shax, almost destoyed him but you two were exposed. The whole saw you on the news."

"No, that couldn't happen." said Prue, hardly convinced.

"It did." Leo continued. "And Phoebe was in the underworld during it to use a new potion on Cole. To take the evil out of him."

"Oh, of course Cole is involved." Prue spat out, rolling her eyes.

"Prue, not the time." Piper interrupted. "Go on." she instructed Leo.

"Well, while it happened, you guys asked me to go to the Underworld and keep an eye on her. But, I couldn't hear you if something happened to one of you guys and you needed me. But, you guys were sure nothing could get any worse. And then, when I went to the Underworld and told Phoebe and Cole, Cole tried to reason with The Source but he believed Cole was only trying to reason with him to help the sisters. And he said he would allow Tempus to reset time if Phoebe would stay in the underworld and be his servant."

"Why would Phoebe agree to that?" Piper asked, seeming more confused.

"To save your life Piper." he hesitated. "You died."

Piper looked like she almost had a stroke.

"What?" Prue choked out.

"Piper was shot. And I arrived back up too late to save her. The whole world freaked out about the exposure."

"This is all our fault." Piper sighed. Prue didn't say anything, but she felt the same.

"So..." Prue had trouble talking, tears were swelling up in her eyes. "Are you telling me that Phoebe sacrificed herself to save our lives, only to have her die?"

Now Leo didn't say anything. His gazed looked downward.

"Look, okay we can't just sit here and let her die. We have to get down there and save her before that bastard hurts her." Piper was fuming.

"Piper, try to stay calm..."

"No Leo, I am beyond staying calm. Our little sister is down there trying to protect us, when it should be the other way around. We need to get to her and bring her back up here."

"If Phoebe escapes, then he'll just send Shax again to kill her. And probably you guys as well." Leo retorted.

"Then we'll fight back. Honestly Leo, why are we even entertaining this argument. Phoebe is going to die if we don't do something! Okay?! That is not an option." Prue's tone was angry and serious. She pushed her hair out of her face and turned to her sister. "I have an extra vainquishing potion downstairs in the cabinet for a high level demon. It might help. Can you get it? I'm going to go search the Book of Shadow's as fast as I can to see if there is anything in there about the Underworld and anything we'll need to know. And then we're leaving." Prue instructed walking back to the book. Piper nodded and without hesitation she walked out of the attic and out of sight.

Leo stood in front of Prue as she searched through the book with burning dedication in her eyes.

"Prue.."

"Leo, don't. We're going to save her. No matter what it takes. If I kill every god-damn demon down there I will to save my sister." Her glared prompted Leo to turn away and he didn't speak again once. She used her index finger to flip through the Book of Shadows faster but came up with no results. Maybe none of the other witches in their line had ever been to the Underworld before. That thought made Prue feel anxiety, they didn't know what to expect. But she knew she couldn't leave her sister down there, especially after her sister saved their lives. Without Phoebe, Piper wouldn't there, and maybe Prue wouldn't either.

Moments later, Piper came running into the attic with the potion in her hands. "Got it."

"Good, okay, now Leo." Prue turned to Leo who was already on his feet, but he seemed indifferent.

"What?! What is it Leo? Is there more?" Piper demanded, responding negatively to his attitude. Prue's eyes narrowed. Why was going to Phoebe such an issue. She would have thought that Leo would have been up for it as much as the others.

"I just think we should consult the Elder's first. See...what they think."

Piper and Prue's starred blankly.

"Leo, you're kidding right?" Prue mused.

"No. Maybe going down in the Underworld with all of you is exactly what The Source wants. All of the Charmed One's together, at his mercy." Leo's explained. His point was valid, and something that the sister's hadn't taken into account.

"Leo, it makes sense. But we don't know how much time we have...we don't even know if she is alive right now." Prue started tearing up. "We have to find her, Leo. We can't wait. And if you won't help us, then Piper and I will write a spell that takes us there ourselves."

Leo didn't say anything. He let out a sigh of disagreement and held out his hands for the two girls. Prue tried to compose herself but was only about to mouth 'thank you' before they orbed.

Darkness, pain, agony - pure evil was all that could be felt from the depths of the Underworld. Even before they fully appeared in the Underworld, Piper and Prue felt the dark strain. Leo had taken them to where he was with them previously. Where Phoebe had met with Cole, but neither could be found. The Sisters looked around frantically and began searching everything within their range of sight, hoping to find their sister.

"Leo, where is she?" Piper was growing more worried.

"I'm not sure." he responded.

"Can you sense her?" Prue pressed.

"I don't know." He closed his eyes for a few moments and cast all of senses out around the Underworld. "I can, but it's very faint..." he didn't sound very convincing.

"Okay, that mean's she is here. We just need to figure that out. Evidentally, she's not in this spot so we have to keep searching." Prue said.

"Approved!" Piper agreed.

"Wait!" the girls stopped and turned to Leo, "You guys, we're in the Underworld. We have to be a little more inconspicuous than just charging into it." Leo said.

"Well, we need to find her. And no demon is going to get in our way." Prue replied, determined.

"Yes, but if word gets to the Source that we're down here, he might kill Phoebe faster." Leo pointed out.

Prue and Piper froze in their steps. Leo was right, whether or not they wanted to admit it. In defeat, Prue lowered her arms and then turned back to Leo once again. Piper walked over to her husband and held his hand.

"He's right Prue..." she said, not wanting to admit it.

"Yeah..." Prue silently agreed. "So what do we do then?"

Leo's lips formed onto a half smile, knowing it took a lot for Prue to admit she was wrong. "Let's go this way." He said, pointing to a cavern behind them. "Maybe we can trap a demon and convince him to tell us where Phoebe is."

This was still very uncertain. Prue, Piper, and Leo were only going on chance - Phoebe couldn't be dead. Prue knew she would never forgive herself. The Underworld had gained it's dark and scary reputation. The walls had various demonic symbols and blood painted all over it. The ground had limbs from what seemed to be several - and different - bodies laying around. No doubt the victims of humans that couldn't survive. Piper placed her hand over her mouth and nose, not trying to breathe in the putrid air that wafted around. Prue, more driven, tried not to let it get to her. The only thing on her mind was finding her sister.

Still, the obvious stigma of being in a place that represented death and darkness did eventually take it's toll on them. Prue could feel body getting weaker, though her determination refused to falter. What was only an hour traveling felt like days. Piper was breathing incredibly hard the deeper they got. Leo held her, healing her back to normal when she needed it, but he too seemed to be suffering from the same thing.

"Leo, I don't understand. Why are feeling this way?" Piper stopped moving and leaned back against her husband.

"Because, continued exposure to the Underworld does take it's toll on mortals." Leo said, matter-of-factly.

"But you seem to be suffering from it as well." Prue had stopped walking as well and knelt down to the ground, as if to calm her nerves; resting for a bit.

"Well, over exposure could do damage to anyone, including...me."

"Great. Have sensed her?" Prue said, looking up?

"Not any more than I have already noticed. But, I think we're getting closer. I hope we can find Cole..." Leo said.

Prue, almost looking furious opened her mouth widely in protest, "Uhh, why - why would you want us to find Cole?" the emphasis she put on his name was almost venomous. It was no secret that Prue didn't like him and he was the last person she wanted helping them.

"Well, because, Cole was the last one with her. Maybe if we found him, he would know where to find Phoebe too."

Piper who seemingly agreed with Leo with a slight nod walked over to Prue, placing her hand on her sister's shoulder "Prue, it might be the only way."

Prue didn't say anything. She stood up and continued walking the same direction that they had been heading in previously. And almost instantly as they progressed a demon came in from around the corner and paused in front of them. Prue looked up, startled and stepped back. The demonw was wearing a long, leather coat, no shirt, and grayish, undefinable material for pants. He stepped forward with a burning rage in his eyes.

"What are you doing here?" he yelled, recognizing Prue as a mortal.

"Uhh." Prue was at a loss for words. The demon closed his eyes and began to sniff. A low growling sound howled in his throat, and when his eyes opened, they were a pitch black.

"A Witch?" His question was more of a statement, and a lecherous grin curved on his lips. He extended his hand and a flame appeared, being concentrated into a ball, ready to be thrown.

"You might not want to do that." Prue said, looking back and forth between the ball and him.

"HEY!" Piper yelled running to her sister's side. She eyed the fireball in the demons hand and before he could throw it, Piper thrusted her arms forward causing the wall behind the demon to blow up, knocking the demon down.

"Good job, Piper." Prue said.

"Damn it. I tried to freeze him. Damn this new power!" she cursed.

The demon got to his feet and howled louder, Prue swung her arm in front of her and sent the demon flying into the wall to the left of him. Prue took Pipers hand and ran over to the demon, which was laying on his stomach. Prue kicked the demon over on his back and pressed her heel on his chest.

"Where is Phoebe?!" Prue demanded. The demon just looked puzzled.

"Who?"

"Phoebe, our sister. Where is she?" Prue continued the interrogation.

"Witch, I don't know where your sister is! Get off of me before I really hurt you." This prompted Prue to dig her heel father into the demons chest, causing him to cry a bit louder.

"Wrong answer!"

"Prue, stop." Leo interrupted, walking over to them, looking very nervous.

"Leo, no, he's a demon, all demons work for the Source. And because of that, he must know where he is keeping our sister."

"You think I know what the Source's agenda is because I'm a demon? The hell I don't!" The demon spoke up angrily. "I have heard rumors that the Source had acquired a Charmed One. And he plans to kill her on the next full moon, when his power is the strongest."

"The next full...moon." Piper gasped. "Oh my god, Prue, that's tonight!"

"I know." Prue then stomped on the demons chest causing him to yell in pain. "Now, I'm not going to ask again, where is he keeping her?!"

"I told you I don't know. If it's the Source, he probably has her locked up in his chamber." the demon began to plead, spilling out answers.

"Where is his chamber then?" Piper asked.

"I don't know..."

"Yeah, right. Liar. Piper, the potion." Prue instructed.

"Wait!" Leo shouted, "he might be telling the truth. The Sources Chamber is only accessible to really powerful, upper level demons." Leo explained. "Which means that we need to find Cole."

"Why do we need to find Cole?!" Prue shouted, almost outraged.

"Because, he talked to the Source. Tried to plead with him. Which means that Cole knows where Phoebe is." Prue still didn't sound satisfied. Leo continued, "Look Prue, we only have until full moon tonight; we don't have a lot of time to interrogate random demons, we need results. He wouldn't have killed Cole. For all we know Cole could be trying to find a way to save her too."

"Yes, Leo. And for all we know he could be dead, too." Prue shot back. Leo exhaled and looked to Piper for support.

"Prue..." Piper began.

"No, Piper. Cole is what got Phoebe in this mess. Tricking her to fall in love with him when he tried to kill us. Then he tried to redeem himself, and then he killed that witch that we worked so hard to save, claiming he didn't mean to do it."

"But he saved Phoebe from becoming a Banshee." Piper pressed on.

"Uhh, what the hell kind of twisted family do you have going on?!" the demon interjected.

"SHUT UP!" Prue and Piper yelled in unison. The demon didn't talk, just tried to subtly escape.

"Prue, it's our only shot. We don't have a lot of time right now. If the Source kills Phoebe, we're all dead. At least with Cole, it's a straight shot." Prue looked like she had just lost a great battle. "Come on Prue. It's two against one." Prue looked up at Piper, shocked. Almost offended that she played that card. Prue grunted and stepped off of the demon and towards Leo.

"Fine. Okay. Fine. Let's just get this over with." Unbeknowist, the demon got up and growled.

"You think you guys can just get away from me?! I hate witches!" He yelled, throwing a fireball towards them.

"Oh!" Prue swung her arm towards it just in time to send it flying back, hitting the demon and causing him to explode with a deadly scream. "I hate demons." she sighed before Leo grabbed them and orbed them back to the manor.

They had found it exactly as they had left it. Still a gaint whole in the wall where Prue and Piper were blasted through. The shattered window behind the dining room still was exposed, and the glass in the front doors of the manor were also shattered. Prue looked around in disbelief. Their home was a demonic battle ground. How were they going to get it cleaned up? This wasn't their priority though. Prue knew that Leo and Piper were right about Cole, as much as she didn't want to admit it. She also knew that they had a vainquishing potion from his flesh remaining, which also proved useful in case something happened for the worse.

Stepping over some of the exposed debris, Prue walked up the staires, up the second floor and to the attic, where she grabbed the Book of Shadows and returned to the first floor. When she returned, Piper had a broom and dust pan in hand, trying to clean up as much as she could by herself. Leo tried to pick up the glass by the dining room. Prue walked over to the dining room table and opened the book, flipping through the pages.

"What are you doing?" Leo asked, taking obvious notice to Prue's search in their magical tome. Piper also took notice to this, sat down her cleaning tools, and walked over to her sister.

"Hold on, there is a spell in here, that would clean everything up." Prue said.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Piper and Leo look at each other, communicating without talking.

"Umm, Prue...is that such a good idea?" Piper asked.

"Piper, personal gain doesn't even matter right now. They have taken so much from us already the least they could leave us with is a clean house." Prue argued. She felt justified and blocked out Piper and Leo's cautious words until she finally found it. The Vanishing Spell. A spell designed to clear any problem or impurity. "Let the object of objection become but a dream as I cause the scene to be unseen." Piper placed a hand over her face, not watching the result of Prue had just done. White sparkling light shimmered out of the book and all around the house, restoring the wall with no mess on the floor, the glass from all of the windows repaired itself and blood stains removed themselves from the floor. Prue then closed the book and turned to Piper. "Happy? Now we can focus on what needs to be done." Prue narrowed her eyes and carried the book to the front room, where she lay the book open on the table and began searching.

Piper followed. "Prue, was that necessary?" Prue ignored her.

"Do you think we should just try the Belthazar summoning spell?" Prue asked. Piper's eyes widened.

"Prue? Are you listening to me?" Piper demanded, frustrated.

"Yes, Piper. I am. You wanted to find Cole, I was out-voted, so we're trying to find Cole."

"Prue, are you listening to yourself? What is the matter with you?"

"I want our sister back Piper! Don't you understand? We can't lose her Piper. We just can't!" Tears started swelling up in Prue's eyes. "We're the Charmed Ones. The Power of Three. So many innocent lives count on our family to help them. Grams and Mom left us with this destiny and left me to make sure this family stays together. I can't...I can't..." she couldn't even talk. Everything she was bottling up was now resurfacing.

"Oh...Prue..." Piper walked over to her sister, sitting down next to her, completely taken off guard by her older sister's responce. She wrapped her arms around Prue and pulled her close to her chest. Prue was still crying, Piper felt her own tears coming.

"Our whole lives, Piper - everything that we've ever worked for - can be destroyed one simple mistake. Our entire future, our entire destiny can be wiped out just like that; I can't get Phoebe back I swear to god..."

"Prue. This isn't your fault. This isn't anyone's fault except evil. Evil has been trying to tear our family apart forever." Piper began. "We can't break down and fight each other now. We need each other. And I need my big sister."

Prue leaned up and wiped the tears off of her eyes. She felt her eyes swollen. She mouthed 'sorry' to Piper and hugged her again. "Well, look who turned into the big sister." Prue laughed. Piper smiled, wiping her own tears out of her eyes. Prue turned to the open book and flipping a few pages until they arrived at Cole's summoning spell.

"Are you ready for this?" Prue asked.

"Wait." Piper stood up, walked over to her bag that she lay down next to the once broken wall and pulled out a vile filled with a dark pink potion. "Vainquishing Potion. Just in case..." she said, walking back to her sister. Leo walked over and stood next to them. The sisters took each other hands and together read the chant.

"Magic Forces, Black and White, Reaching out through space and light, be he far or be he near, bring us the demon Balthazor here." They repeated the chant three times, a large wind like vortex appeared in front of them, causing the book's pages to flip back and forth. Prue's hair was blowing in her face, but she didn't break concentration. They continued to speak it over and over again, and yet, nothing appeared. The vortex calmed and disappeared altogether. Prue and Piper looked around, as if they missed something.

"Okay...I'm confused. Shouldn't that have worked?" Piper said, irritated.

"Yeah...uhh." Prue was just as confused.

"Did you guys do it right?" Leo asked. Prue and Piper glared at him. Was he serious? Leo raised his hands, signaling his backing off, "Alright, sorry."

"This isn't the first time he's resisted the spell." Prue said. "What if, we reworded it, so that we go to him. He can't prevent that, can he?" Piper didn't know the answer any better than Prue did, but it was a shot. Prue took out a piece of paper from under their table and a pen and began to rearrange the words.

"Leo, can you sense her? Maybe the Source has moved Phoebe to the surface?" Piper asked, hopeful. Leo shook his head. "Of course." she muttered under her breath.

"This should do it." Prue said. Only the last two lines were rewritten.

Together, they chanted, "Magic forces black and white, reaching our through space and light. Be he near or be he far, bring us to the demon Belthazor." the parchment set aflame and shimmered into white lights that began swirling around the sisters.

"I guess this is it?" Prue asked, the lights getting bigger.

"Leo, find us!" Piper yelled, her voice echoed in the manor and they vanished. Nervously, Leo began to look around, making sure it didn't back fire. He shook his head and orbed out of the manor, in an attempt to find them.

Prue and Piper appeared in a bright flash of light in an alley outside a local club. They looked around extremely confused. There was no sign of struggle, panic, and certainly no sign of life; even Cole. So why where they there? Prue tossed her hair out of her face as she turned her head frequently. They remained quiet, trying to hear for something, but no noise - except cars in the distance, came. Prue and Piper began walking father down the ally in an attempt to understand why there brought to where they were.

"Anything look suspicious?" Prue asked.

"Nothing.." Piper replied.

Then, suddenly. The sisters froze. A sound so terrible came from the distance. A womans cry of fear echoed through the ally. But where was it? Prue and Piper spun around in circles trying to place it, but nothing came.

"Uhh. Prue, which way?" Piper asked, hopeful.

"This way." Prue made a decision on instinct, hopefully they were right. Was Cole trying to hurt someone? Prue only feared. She could sense that Piper feared that too. They were approaching a turn where a the same scream of terror was coming from. They sisters felt relieved they were heading the right way but afraid of what they would fine around the corner. They turned and froze. Cole was standing in front of woman who had a blue forcefield holding him back. Another witch, no doubt. Cole, with a black robe on and insanity as well as desperation covered all over his face was approaching her, with an energy ball in his hand.

"Cole! What are you doing?!" Piper yelled. He didn't seem to hear her. "Prue, the energy ball!" Prue swung her arms and the energy ball flew out of his hand and into a wall, creating a scortch mark. Cole noticed this and turned, looking shocked to actually see the sisters standing in front of him.

"Help me, please!" The woman cried, crawling back in desperation. Prue swung her arm once again and sent Cole flying back a few feet. Piper ran towards the girl and helped her up from the ground.

"Hey, it's okay. It's alright. It's over. Run." Without a further invitation, the girl took off behind Prue and further down the ally. Piper walked over to meet Prue who was standing behind Cole as he got up from the ground. "Cole, what the hell was that?" Piper roared.

"Why did you do that?" Malice and anger was in his voice.

"Ummm, excuse me? You were just about to kill an innocent woman. We weren't going to just let you do that!"

"Prue, stop trying to be a saint. I was trying to save your sister."

Taken off guard, Prue said nothing.

"What do you mean? Killing another witch would have saved her?" Piper asked, furiously.

"No, not killing her. But taking her. The Source has Phoebe." Cole said.

"Yeah. We know. We already know this, we were trying to find you to take us to his chamber and save Phoebe." Prue said simply.

"Are you kidding me?" Cole's eyes widened, knowing something they didn't. "One doesn't just walk into his chamber. The Source threatened to kill her unless I could find another witch just as strong to trade."

"Cole!" Prue was now furious. "Are you serious? You were just going to take an innocent witch to the Source?"

"I had no choice, Prue. We can't beat him, not without the Power of Three. And since he has one of you guys, there is no way in hell you two are going to see Phoebe again." Cole turned away from them and began walking off.

"Hey! Wait! Where do you think you're going?!" Prue demanded.

"To find that witch. It's the only chance we got." Cole said, waving them off dismissivly.

"Like Hell!" Piper thrusted her arms forward and Cole froze instantly. Prue's mouth dropped.

"Uhh, Piper, you could have just killed him!"

"I took a chance." said as they approached him. "Look, we need him. So, LEO!!! LEO!!" She began to yell. "We need to take him back to the manor and think of a plan." Leo's bright blue and white orbs appeared before them and solidified into his form. "Leo, orb us back to the manor. Quickly, quickly!" Piper instructed.

With no protest, Leo placed a hand on Cole, Piper took his and Prue took Pipers hand. They all orbed out.

An hour went by after they returned to the manor. By some miracle, Cole remained frozen while the witches, and Leo formed a plausible plan to save their sister. Piper had brewed nearly a dozen potions in viles. Prue was writing down some counter spells and charms. Hopefully their plan would prove successful. Piper finally twisted her hands in the air, releasing him of her power. Cole fell forward. He took in his surroundings, knowing exactly where he was. The only question was how he got there. And then he saw Piper walk by him. His eye's narrowed and he slowly approached the sisters with an indifferent expression on his face. They seemed to have something planned, they were handing each other potions and spells and stuffing them in their pockets.

Cole stopped in front of them. The sisters knew he was there but didn't awknowledge his entrance.

"Uhh, what is going on?" Cole asked, abruptly, confused.

"Well, we brought you back here." Piper replied.

"Obviously," Cole became frustrated, not getting the answer he wanted. "And?" he pressed on.

"And, you're going to help us get our sister back. Our way. You're not going to sacrifice an innocent witch." Prue said.

"Prue, that is the only --"

"I know, Cole." she interrupted. "We have taken that into account. Which is why you're going to offer me as a trade. One sister for the other. While he begins to trade us, You, Piper, and Leo will cause a distraction, we'll break Phoebe out of there and escape."

Cole shook his head. "You think it'll be that easy?" he walked over to a chair and sat down.

"No Cole, this won't be easy at all. But I think this plan could work." Prue corrected.

"This is crazy. We could all be killed." Cole yelled.

"Well, what difference does it make? If we do nothing, Phoebe will die. The power of three will be broken, and in turn, Piper and I will probably die anyway. So, if death is our only option in the end, what more do we have to lose?" Prue said. Piper didn't look at either of them. She didn't agree that Prue was going to be the one for trade, it just put her life more in danger, but their choices were slim pickings. Prue knew that Piper was taking it hard and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "Come on."

Surprisingly enough, Leo was quiet, though it was known he didn't support the plan either. He knew arguing with them was pointless. The risk of losing Phoebe was too great.

"If we do this, we have to be precise. The Source will detect deception immediately. He's not stupid." Cole pointed out.

"I know Cole. But like I said...what more do we have to lose?" Prue sighed.

Returning to the depths of the Underworld, Prue and Piper held their breath, still not used to the darkness they were breathing in. Their plan was precise, Cole would take Prue and offer an exchange, while Piper and Leo stayed close behind to help cause a distraction long enough for Prue to get Phoebe. If the plan worked, they would be able to get out fine. If not...

None of them thought of that result.

Cole carried Prue in his arms, under the pretense of capturing her himself. The doors to the Sources Chamber were very tall and wide, covered in dark chains. Cole closed his eyes and concentrated his demonic energy on the door which immediately caused it to open. Cole took his time entering, allowing Piper and Leo time to orb in there before him and hide. The atmosphere was relatively different than the rest of the underworld. Instead of looking like a cave, it appeared to be a more open space - almost like a beach. Red water surrounded the out edges of the Chamber. There was sky that was also a dark red, with deep purple clouds; lightning flashed nearly every second. Demonic guards stood side by side the closer Cole traveled in, arriving only feet before the Source himself, who was covered in a dark red robe and sitting on a throne. His face was cloaked by darkness.

"Ah. Belthazor." He said, his voice echoing through the chamber. The Source took notice of the other sister and waved his hand behind the guards, revealing a cage that had Phoebe in it. She was sitting against the back of it, with her hands around her knee's pulled to her chest. "Did you find another witch?" The Source asked.

"I have." Cole responded. Phoebe looked up, saw Prue in his arms and stood up immediately.

"Cole! What are you doing?" She yelled. Cole didn't look at her.

"Present her." The Source waved his arm and a table appeared in front of Cole. He lay Prue down on it for all of the guards and the Source to see. "Another Charmed One."

"Yes. You asked for another Witch just as powerful. Prue is the strongest of the three." Cole said in a pleading voice.

"So it seems." The Source replied simply. Cole became very nervous internally, the Source hadn't said anything, just observed. Cole feared that the Source saw through their plan.

"My Lord." Cole began, "I have done what you have asked of me. Will you now give me back Phoebe?"

For moments, the Source still didn't say anything.

"Damnit Cole! What are you doing?!" Phoebe shouted in protest. "Get Prue out of here! Now!" tears were forming in her eyes. She was becoming very angry, all she did was seeming pointless. She wanted her sisters to be saved, and still it wasn't happening.

"Very interesting Belthazor. Trading one Charmed One for the other. Interesting indeed."

Cole was hesitating, feeling like he was giving himself away, however, fortunately, the Source waved his hand at his cage which prompted it to unlock. "Guards. Remove the captured one and place her in the others place." Two guards walked over to Phoebe's cage, pulled it open and grabbed her. She struggled, kicking both of them away. Finally one of them grabbed her by the hair and tossed her to the ground.

"No, don't do it. Prue! Wake up! PRUE!" Phoebe shouted, struggling as one of the guards grabbed her and carried her towards Cole. Another guard picked Prue up and began walked her to the cage.

"How could you do this, Cole?" Phoebe muttered, falling to her knee's sobbing.

"Let this be a lesson to you Witch. The power of evil always wins." The Source began to gloat.

"Hardly." Prue opened her eyes and squinted them, send the guard that was holding her flying back.

"What is this?!" The Source roared. The lightning in the sky began to strike the clouds faster and a loud, monstrous thunder roared above.

Prue stood up and began swinging her arms onto oncoming guards. "Piper! Leo! Now!" Out of the darkness, the other two caming running into the scene. Leo orbed behind two guards and struck them down. Piper threw a potion at a group of guards causing them to combust. Cole lowered his arm to Phoebe helping her up.

"What is this?" Phoebe asked in disbelief.

"You didn't think I was really going to let them have one of your sisters, did you?" Cole said with a faint smile. Phoebe, who looked completely relieved reached up and pulled Cole's face down to hers and kissed him passionately.

"Thank you." She whispered.

"Pheebs. not the time for this." Prue yelled from behind her, sending a demon flying into the dark waters behind the Source.

"What is this folly?!" The Source was now outraged, his voice echoing all through his chamber. More demons began to appear.

Piper thrusted her arms forward trying to freeze or blast as many away as she could, not noticing a demon behind her; Phoebe did however. She ran towards her sister and jumped in the air, levitating across and kicking the demon square in the face. She turned around and kicked another demon away before Cole threw an energy ball it and vanquished it.

Prue was trying to break through the demons charging at her. They seemed to be their primary target. Prue seemed to be gaining some ground, and then the Source stood up from his throne. He waved his arm at Prue and sent her fly back to the ground, hard, knocking the wind out of her.

"Oh my god. Prue!" Piper yelled, trying to get to her, blasting demons out of her way. "Leo!" Piper gestured her arms towards her sister and Leo made an attempt to orb towards her. The Source opened his hand and a bolt of lightning struck Leo's orbs and sent him crashing to the ground.

"This isn't good." Cole said, standing next to Phoebe. vanquishing as many as he could with Energy balls. Prue struggled to stand up and held her left arm in pain with her right. She looked up at the Source with fury painted on her face.

"You misrable coward!" She swung her right arm trying to send the Source flying back. The Source held up his hand as if to block it and sent it right back, sending Prue flying back once more. He began to approach the fallen sister, with the intent to kill her right then and there. Cole stepped up and threw large energy ball at the Source, pushing him forward a little bit. The Source turned.

"That wasn't wise, Belthazor." This distraction was long enough for Leo to quickly orb in and take Prue, orbing back to where the other sisters were. The Source turned and saw Prue gone. "What? No!" He turned to face all of them. Leo had already healed Prue enough for her to stand up. The Three Sisters took each others hands and began to chant.

"The Power of Three will set us free. The Power of three will set us free. The Power of three will us free." Together in unison. The Source threw an energy ball them which deflected off. The demons remaing around them began to combust in flames. Then, the Source himself began to fall to his knee's. He waved his arm, sending a bolt of lightning at them, but Cole sent one of his own, causing it fly in another direction.

"You Witches have just made a grave mistake. You may have won this time, but I assure you, it won't last!" The Source himself began to catch on fire, the Halliwells didn't stop chanting. "AH! No!" The Source yelled, shimmering out of his Chamber.

"The Power of Three will set us free..." They stopped. The chamber was now vacant. Without waiting for another moment, Leo touched the sisters and orbed out, back to the manor. Cole shimmered out and followed.

Once in the manor, Prue and Piper latched onto their little sister, hugging her tight.

"Oh Phoebe!" Piper exclaimed. "Why did you do that? Do you know how dangerous it was?"

"I just couldn't lose you guys. I had to. Either one of you would have done the same." Phoebe replied back, her voice inaudible due to tears of relief and joy.

"I was worried I would see you again." Prue said. She kissed the side of Phoebe's head and hugged her tighter.

"Well I know we're having a much better day than the Source right now." Phoebe muttered.

The three sister's laughed.

A combination of loud music and people talking amongst themsevles filled the air of P3. Piper was handing out drinks from behind the bar. It seemed more crowded than usual, she didn't mind. The business was good. She looked over and saw Cole, Phoebe, Prue, and Leo sitting in an area of chairs that they usually did in the back of the bar. She smiled, knowing that is where she wanted to be.

"Hey Michael." Piper said, addressing the bartender next to her. "I'm taking fifteen." she said. Her employee nodded. Piper grabbed a tray of drinks to bring to them and walked out into the crowd, shuffling through.

The people were really into the music, making it harder than usual for Piper to manuever around them. And then, someone bumped into her, causing her fall back, however, she was caught and the girl behind her helped her gain composure.

"Woah, easy there." said the girl.

"Oh, no problem." Piper looked back at her savior. She had fair skin, dark hair and eyes. Rosy cheeks and lips - someone who she hadn't seen in her club before. "Oh hey, you're the owner, right? Piper...Halliwell?" the girl asked, hoping she was right.

"Yeah. I am." Piper replied simply.

"Oh, nice to meet you. The club is great. My name is Paige." she said with a smile.

"Well Paige thank you for helping me not make a fool of myself." Piper smiled. "Michael!" She turned towards her bartender. "Get this girl whatever she likes, on me." Piper turned and smiled. Paige looked shocked.

"Oh you don't have to do that!"

"I insist. Now go, take advantage of bad habits." Piper laughed.

"Thank you. See you around." Paige said. Piper nodded and waved her off, returning to her sisters. Piper set down the tray and handed out the drinks.

"We saw your almost casualty." Prue laughed.

"Yeah. I can always count on you to say the right things, can't I, Prue?" this caused Prue to laugh. Piper sat down next to Leo, kissed him and turned to the rest of them. "What a day."

"I know it. I mean honestly, hour ago when I imagined what was going to happen to me tonight, I never thought I'd be sitting here, with you guys again." Phoebe said. Cole wrapped his arms around her, tighter.

"One thing I still don't understand though." Prue started.

"One thing?" Piper mused.

"Yeah, I mean, in the other reality, one of us died. Whenever we were down there, I was sure the Source was going to kill me. Not to put a damper on our victory here, but wasn't one of us supposed to die in the end?" Prue's question provoked sad reactions from all of them. They had all been thinking it, just didn't choose to bring it up.

"Well, not necessarily. I mean, you guys rewrite the future all the time. It wouldn't be the first time you prevented something from happening before." Leo tried to lighten the mood.

"Yeah. But I think, now more than ever, we need to be more cautious. We didn't see today coming...and today might not even be the worst of it." Piper chimed in. The mood had significantly changed. They were all worried about what was in store - now the Source was really angry. Before, he only sent Shax after an innocent. Now will he send him after the sisters?

"Thank you guys again. For saving me. I don't know where I would be without you guys." Phoebe said. Prue and Piper smiled, Cole kissed the top of her head.

"Well be fine. We'll just have to stick together now more than ever." Prue said. Phoebe smiled. Prue placed her hand on Phoebe's, "Witches forever?"

"And proud of it." Phoebe replied. The girls continued in a laugh, basking in their temporary glory. They had tonight, and tonight, they would enjoy themselves. Whatever the Source had in store for them would be tomorrow's problem.


	2. Elder Sister

Charmed: Rewitched.

Season 4 Episode 2

Elder Sister

A light shone in the distance, not too bright, but bright enough to be considered ethereal, even hypnotic. An orb of light began to glow, as if transmitting a response to something. And then, the setting began to become more clear – a dark, yet familiar place was settling into the picture; the Underworld. A dark figure shimmered into the picture. He was tall, ominous, brooding as he approached the orb. Only one being could command the kind of fear in his countenance, The Source of Evil.

"May I be seen?" said a voice, hovering over the orb.

"Yes." The source waved his hand over the orb and a elegant, pristine figure appeared. The Oracle was the Sources personal guide. He approached her and placed a hand on her exposed shoulder. "The Charmed One's escaped." He stated.

"I know." She replied simply. She adjusted her body and placed a hand over the orb of light.

"Then why didn't you warn me sooner? I should kill you for your mistake." The Source was angry in his voice.

"The future is never certain." She defended herself in a light-mannered tone, almost as if she didn't care. "But," she began with defiance in her voice. "You might want to keep me around for a little while longer…" The Source froze, there was more than she was letting on.

This intrigued him, "What do you see?" he demanded.

"The Charmed One's are strong because of their bond as sisters; their bond as a family. Corrupt that, and victory is almost certain." Her exposition made the Source impatient. He already knew this, she adjusted herself and looked into the orb. "I see, a hidden secret traveling on the spirit wind; an evil secret. I see…another." Her voice echoed out.

Phoebe's eyes opened quickly and she shot up out of bed. Her body sweating, her breath faster than usual; she looked over to find Cole still sleeping right next to her, unaffected by her sudden awakening. She raised her hand to her chest which was covered in sweat. She took in a deep breath to calm her nerves; it was obviously a premonition, but she wasn't used to having them in her sleep.

Phoebe took the covers off of her body carefully, trying not to wake Cole, and stepped onto her floor. The coolness of the ground made her feel a little more calm and relaxed. She stepped out of her room, walked across the hall and stepped into her bathroom. After she flipped the light on, she stepped towards the sink, turned the cold water on and held her hands under it and then raised it to her face, giving her a feeling of cool relief.

She sighed.

The premonition was intense. She could still feel the dark strain the underworld had on her from the previous day, it was all too familiar to have it again. But what provoked the premonition? That was the question that she was having the hardest time answering. The vision itself was a warning sign, that she was given for a reason, but she didn't understand. Corrupt the family? An evil, hidden secret? Another?

Phoebe paused. Another what? Her eyes traveled to Piper's watch which was laid on the counter top, it was four in the morning. Her eyes rolled and she moaned out of fatigue. How did she expect herself to sleep after that bullet?

Dawn loomed around a much unwelcomed corner. At least it was a Saturday. Prue tossed and turned before she finally sat up and embraced the day. Not even sleep seemed to rejuvenate energy from the previous day. Even though Leo had healed her completely, the strain from the Sources attack seemed to still cause tension in her whole body. She got up from her bed and walked out of her bedroom and down the stairs. It was only ten in the morning when it felt much earlier.

Walking into the kitchen she was surprised to find Phoebe in the kitchen alone. She didn't seem to notice her older sister standing between the threshold of the kitchen door. Prue took notice to Phoebe's seemingly lost expression.

"Good morning." Prue walked over to the fridge and pulled out some water. Phoebe jumped and looked over.

"Oh God! Prue, you scared me." she took in a deep breath, it was clearly obvious she was on edge. "Good Morning."

"Are you okay?" she asked, sitting across from her sister at the kitchen table. Prue took a sip from her water half expecting a Cole problem.

"No…not really." Phoebe said, seeming really serious and shook up.

"Phoebe," Prue also became more serious, "What is it?"

"Prue, I had a premonition last night, in my sleep. It was about the Source and his Oracle. I don't know how I got it, but I did."

"Woah, you're getting premonitions in your sleep now?"

"I guess so, but this was more than just a premonition. I felt it, it was like…I was there. Standing next to the Source, feeling the evil exuding off of him." Prue didn't say anything, mostly due to lack of anything to say. "He's planning something Prue. When he said he was coming after us, he wasn't kidding." Phoebe's hands were shaking.

"What do you mean?" Prue got up from her seat from across Phoebe and walked over to sit down right next to her. Phoebe turned.

"I'm not sure. The oracle said something about the way to destroy us is through corruption. And something about an evil, hidden secret. And then something about 'another.'" Phoebe placed emphasis on that last word.

"Another? Another what?"

"I don't know." Phoebe digressed. Prue's expression began to fill with concern, not only for her sister, but for all of them.

The Halliwell Manor was relatively quiet for the remainder of the morning, it wasn't until the late afternoon until Leo finally orbed into the living room, where the sisters were looking through their magical tome. Piper looked up with a hopeful expression.

"The elders don't know what the Source is doing." He said simply.

"Leo, that's not good enough." Phoebe stood up from the couch and began pacing back and forth; anxiety was taking over, "I mean, obviously, I had this premonition for a reason. The Source is up to something. I mean, I'm afraid to go to sleep again, what if I have another?"

"I –"

"Phoebe," Piper interrupted, "I'm sure Leo has been doing all he can. The Elders aren't likely to give an answer unless either, they have one, or unless it's something we have to figure out on our own."

"Sounds like them." Phoebe muttered before sitting back down on the couch, between her sisters, clearly defeated. She wouldn't let it go completely, but for now.

Prue knelt over the book and began opening it, "Well, at least you have one thing that came out of this positive."

"What's that Prue?" Phoebe replied sarcastically, yet curious.

"Well, your powers are obviously advancing. How often have you gotten premonitions in your sleep before? Especially like these?"

"That's true." Leo chimed in. "The Elders even agreed that your powers are growing."

"Great. Premonitions…in my sleep. So I have to be a witch even when I'm in slumber. I'm telling you, you two got the easy powers."

"Ha!" Piper yelled. "Easy? I don't know what you're talking about. I can't even raise my hands without wondering if something is going to blow up."

"Yeah, but Piper, that power is totally awesome. Why, I don't know where we would be if you hadn't of blown up more than half of the Source's personal guards." Piper began to glow at Prue's comment.

"Guys, there is still a problem. Let's not get side tracked." Leo said. The sisters turned to him.

"Uhh. We know, Phoebe's premonition, dark secret?" Prue replied.

"No." Leo turned to face all of them. "The Elders are growing concerned, there has been a lot of demonic activity up here. Many people, future Whitelighters and Elders are being killed before they even come into their own."

"Is that all?" Phoebe said, almost dismissively.

"No…Shax is killing them, with another demon, Arjax." Leo finished. Prue's eyes seemed to have glazed over in concern.

"Okay…" Piper grunted. "We know Shax…but who is Arjax? _Another_ one of the Sources Assassins?"

"Yes. But, a lower level than Shax. He's just there to assist in case real Elders or Whitelighters try to intervene with their targets."

"Do we even know where to look?" Prue asked, shaking her head in annoyance – trying to process the gravity of the task.

"Well…no."

"Oh Good." Prue replied blankly.

"The Elders did however give us a lead. It's not certain but it is something. We can go and observe for anything that may give us a clue." Leo said.

"Alright, well, it beats sitting here waiting for the Source to expose an evil secret." Phoebe replied mockingly. It was evident that she was angry her premonition was being taken light hearted – or at least that it appeared to be that way. She got up from the couch and began walking up the stairs.

"Uh where are you going, Pheebs?" Prue got up from the couch and stood at the bottom of the stairwell.

"I am going to see if Cole is back yet. We might need his help, plus, maybe he knows if something is going on." Phoebe answered in a slightly irate tone.

"I don't think that's such a good idea." Prue replied, this prompted Piper to get up from the couch too and she joined her older sister at the foot of the stairs.

"Why?"

"Prue, maybe we shouldn't?" Piper muttered.

"Shouldn't what?"

"Look," Prue folded her arms. "Whenever you were stuck in the underworld, we tried to summon Cole to us because he might have known where you were. But, we ended up having to make a spell to find him and we…did."

"So?" Phoebe shook her head, raising her right eyebrow suspiciously.

"Phoebe, we found him hovering over a witch. An innocent witch, willing to sacrifice her to save you, and had Piper and I not got there in time, he might have."

Piper remained silent, preparing to intervene if she felt she needed too. Phoebe was also silent, a look of surprise shaping on her face.

"But Prue, he did save me – us. Without Cole we might not have escaped the Underworld. And he was doing it to save me." She argued back.

"Yes, but if he succeeded in bringing that witch to the Source, it might not have satisfied him enough and he could have killed you and her." Prue's point was made quite clear. Phoebe knew she couldn't find her on it anymore. "My point is, Cole has been put through a…difficult time. We all have. But since Cole is still a demon, and having been exposed to the Underworld, much less, the Source for awhile, he might not be able to displace good from evil right now."

Phoebe still remained silent, also appearing a little hurt.

"I think what she's trying to say Phoebe is that Cole might need some time to…" Piper choked on her words, trying to find the one, "adjust…" she still wasn't satisfied completely. "Yeah – just some time to adjust properly." That seemed to smooth a slight amount of tension on the subject but Phoebe was still at a loss for words.

"Alright." She said simply, walking back down the stairs. She passed Prue without looking at her and walked straight to Leo. "Let's get this over with."

Prue bit her lip, her arms still folded and walked over to join her and Leo with Piper right behind her. In a matter of moments the four of them orbed out of the Halliwell Manor.

-

Where they arrived, it wasn't what they expected. It was an alley far too familiar. They were behind P3. Piper looked around just to be sure, but she knew her club, and the others were equally surprised.

"Uhh, Leo?" Piper began.

"Yeah, I know. It's strange. It's just where they told me to go."

"To my club? Doesn't the Underworld know my club is closed during the day? Or…to them always?" She grunted.

"Piper, let's just look around. Better that we find them in the daylight, no one comes to P3 during the day, which means we can draw attention to ourselves." Prue said.

"Yeah. Like you did the other day." Phoebe shot back a glance and continued.

"Phoebe, that's not fair. That future was reversed." Leo was on the defense, unhappy with Phoebe's attitude.

"Yeah, you're right. But it wasn't my fault it happened. I do believe it was Prue's idea to chase Shax down in broad daylight." Phoebe retorted.

"Okay, yeah. Maybe that was my idea in that reality, but it's a lesson learned." Prue said narrowing her eyes.

"Right. So I should stop punishing you for your past convictions?"

"Yes, Phoebe. You should!" Prue yelled.

"Really?! Okay, I'll stop once you stop doing that to Cole!"

"This is so not the same thing, Phoebe." Prue's voice was low, serious.

"Guys," Piper said, "Let's not do this here."

"Oh, isn't it Prue?" Phoebe asked, ignoring Piper completely. "If I had not agreed to the Sources deal, Piper would be dead right now, the whole world would know that we're witches, and oh yeah, this would be all because of you!"

"Okay that was one mistake, Phoebe. A mistake that you do not have the right to take out on me because that was in a different reality. I can't control what I did that day. But I didn't do it intentionally Phoebe and that's my point. Cole was born a demon; killing is an instinct to him. And at the end of the day he is still just a demon." Prue was yelling now. Piper turned away towards Leo and closed her eyes, it was evident that she was getting a head ache now.

Troubled, Leo tried to get a few words in but was drowned out completely.

"But Prue he's been trying, because of me. He wants to do good and he has done good for us. Why is that not taken into account? He is trying, Prue!" Phoebe yelled back.

"Yes, he sure as hell looked like it when he was attacking that girl yesterday!"

"Prue, will you just -"

"Phoebe look out!" Just then, an energy ball came flying through the air towards Phoebe, Leo jumped towards her, grabbed her in time to orb her out of the way, and orbed back behind where Piper was standing.

"What the hell was that?" Piper said, looking around. Then, almost instantly, a venomous laugh began echoing through the alley.

"Really?" Prue mocked, "Laughter and an energy ball, isn't evil usually more insidious than that?" she rolled her eyes, but still remained on her guard. The laughter then stopped, and then a loud, horrific scream a girl came from around the corner.

The sisters and Leo reacted instantly and ran towards it. The found a girl, wearing what seemed to be a school uniform, couldn't have been older than sixteen years of age, red hair and glasses, slowly backing up from a demon with black skin and green outlined marks. He was grotesque in almost every way, with yellow eyes that craved death.

"Hey!" Prue swung her arm and sent the demon flying back into a wall.

"Oh good, that wasn't part of P3. I'm good with that." Piper exhaled a deep breath and ran towards the girl who seemed quite confused.

"I don't understand. You're witches too?" she asked timidly.

"Too?" Phoebe caught the last word.

"Yes." Piper replied, moving her aside. Prue turned to look at the young witch, almost astounded at how young she was, not noticing the demons reemergence. The demon thrust his arm forward and released another ball of energy.

"Look out!" The girl shouted, she raised her hand and yelled, "Energy ball!" the energy ball glittered with blue and white orbs, she pointed her hand towards the alley where the sisters originally were. "Alley way!" the orbs disappeared and a crash was heard in the distance.

"Oh gosh, I hope that wasn't my club!" Piper yelled.

"Well, that explains the energy ball almost getting you Phoebe. It did literally come out of nowhere. She orbed it at you." Leo confirmed. The girl turned, flabbergasted and embarrassed.

"Oh no! I'm so sorry, I didn't know."

"It's…alright." Phoebe lied. Piper ran towards the demon and threw her arms forward, freezing the demon in place.

"Well, I don't see Shax anywhere." Phoebe deduced.

"Who's Shax?" the girl asked.

"A demon you don't want to come up against." Piper summarized before Leo could force out a lengthy explanation. "Who are you?"

"My name is Aubrey…" She said. "I'm a witch too, obviously."

"Alright Aubrey, I'm Piper. This is Prue and Phoebe, and that is Leo." She introduced everyone before beginning her interrogation. "What were you doing here? Shouldn't you be in school?" she asked, basing her assumption on her outfit.

"Oh, school. I kinda left. I thought I sensed trouble around here, like, someone in trouble, but really, I just sensed a demon. And then he attacked me once I got far enough into the alley." Aubrey explained.

"Okay. So, if this isn't Shax then is it…" Prue tried to remember that other demon Leo mentioned earlier. "Arjax?" Prue asked.

"Yeah. It could be, I don't know." Leo replied.

"So much help." Piper said sarcastically, walking up to the demon. She twisted her hand, allowing the demons face to unfreeze. "Are you Arjax?" she asked.

The demon's eyes narrowed, "Yes I am Witch! And if you don't let me go right now I'm gonna -" Piper twisted her hand again and froze his head back.

"Well, that answers that." Piper turned around, and just then, two more demons shimmered in and growled loudly. She turned in panic, threw her arms forward and blew one of them up. The other one began to growl even louder.

And then, a golden, white light fell from the sky and orbed down next to Leo and Aubrey. Piper, Phoebe, and Prue turned towards it to find that it was an old man in a golden robe of an elder. Leo bowed his head in respect.

"Elder Sanko, you shouldn't be down here. Demons!" Leo urged.

"I know." He put his hand in the air to silence Leo. "This girl is one of the ones we have instructed you about. Evil must not get her…or her powers. She has the latent ability to orb herself. If evil figures that out..." he didn't need to finish that sentence.

"How can we keep her safe?" Prue asked. She turned her head and looked at the demon who seemed more concerned that Arjax was frozen.

"Like this." Sanko said, waving his hand at Aubrey and Prue. White lights cascaded from both of them and switched places. Aubrey's went into Prue and vice versa.

Prue's eyes narrowed in horror. "No you didn't."

"HA!" The demon yelled from behind them. Sanko orbed away and Prue turned. She waved her hand at the oncoming energy ball from the unfrozen Arjax and her whole body orbed out, just barely missing it and orbed back in.

"Leo! We need to get out of here!" Phoebe yelled. Leo grabbed onto the four of them and orbed away right before another set of energy balls hit them.

-

"THEY REPLACED MY POWERS LEO!" Prue roared. "What the hell were they thinking?!" she was pacing back and forth through their kitchen. "Doesn't this make us more vulnerable? We're the Power of Three and now I can't even use my powers. How am I supposed to fight back?" she demanded.

Leo was at a loss for words, not really understanding it himself, "Look, they have their reasons for doing things. Sanko is a good Elder. He wouldn't have given you a new set of powers unless he thought you could handle them."

"This isn't permanent, right? I mean, it can't be!" Prue was fuming.

"No…I don't think so."

"Oh good. Now I just have to wait!"

"Well, you could try to learn how to use your new powers. I mean…it couldn't hurt." Leo sighed.

"Yeah. Right."

"So wait. That means I have your powers too?" Aubrey spoke up.

"Yes, you do." Prue said, bitterly.

"Doesn't that make me vulnerable to? I mean, I don't know how to use your powers."

"Another good point!" Prue pointed out, looking upward toward the ceiling, as if gesturing that the Elders were listening to the argument.

"Prue, just stop. You can't change what they did until Aubrey is safe. So, let's focus on that." Leo said. Prue sat down at the table in the kitchen and folded her arms angrily.

"Well, maybe that's it." Phoebe said.

"What?" Leo asked, interested.

"Well, what if we vanquish Arjax. You said he and Shax were going after witches. Obviously, Arjax wouldn't be stupid enough to go to the source empty handed on this one, which means the Source probably doesn't know Aubrey isn't dead yet. So, if we can kill Arjax, we might be able to get the Source off of her trail. It's not like he and Shax are killing victims together, otherwise Shax would have been there too."

"That actually does make some sense." Piper said.

"Well, I'm for it. It's a plan." Prue said, getting up from the table.

"I think I should go talk to the elders first…" Leo began.

"No. You can stay and watch Aubrey while we go look in the Book of Shadows to see if there is a way to vanquish Arjax easily, okay?" Prue said walking out of the kitchen.

"Well, I can help. I'm good at making potions, assuming that's what you guys might be doing." Aubrey said shyly. Prue stopped.

"How old are you, exactly?" Piper asked.

"Seventeen…" She replied.

"How do you know so much about the craft at a young age?" Piper asked.

"Well, my mother was a witch, my dad a whitelighter. They taught me things growing up and how to control my powers at a young age. But, a darklighter killed them both six years ago. Now I live with my grandmother. She knows about the craft – it's where my mom inherited it. But she doesn't know that I know as much as I do…" she finished.

Piper marveled at the unique parallelism Aubrey had with their lives. She took Aubrey in her arms and led her out of the Kitchen with Phoebe and Prue. "You're coming with us. Four is better than three." Piper smiled.

Their book was still in the living room on the table. The girls gathered around it and began turned the pages until they found him. Arjax wasn't nearly as powerful as Shax; he was an assassin still, but with a mediocre evil reputation. The sisters wondered why the Source wanted him to hunt other witches.

"Well, I mean, this isn't too bad. Standard vanquishing potion. Perfect iambic pentameter chant. It's all pretty basic to vanquish him." Phoebe said enthusiastically. But it was obvious the pieces didn't fit. It didn't seem like the Source was trying too hard.

All four of the girls suddenly jumped with the abrupt shimmering of Cole into the room.

"Damn it Cole!" Piper yelled, catching her breath. Cole held his right index finger to his lips to indicate silence was needed. The girls looked around.

Just then, a demon shimmered into the house with a glow of red. Cole hurled an energy ball it, however the demon dodged it, which resulted in the energy ball blowing up the grandfather clock behind it.

"Damn it! We just got that thing fixed! Again!" Piper yelled. The demon turned his attention to the witches and threw a ball of fire towards Prue and Piper. Prue held up her hand, mimicking Aubrey's gesture back in the alley, hoping to catch it through orbs, but ended up, once again, orbing herself out of the room. Freaked out, Piper barely managed to freeze it before it hit her. "Prue! Where the hell are you?!"

Prue orbed back into place, her eyes widened with the sight out of how close the ball fire was. "I don't know how to control it." She said.

Phoebe ran towards the demon, levitated in the air and kicked it in its face, knocking it back. "We need to finish it!" she yelled.

Aubrey looked at the energy ball, swung her hand towards it and sent it at the demon, causing it to combust instantly. The sisters, Cole, and Leo looked at her with astonishing surprise.

"How did you do that?" Prue asked, stunned.

"Well, you power is telekinesis right? It just looked at it, thought about where I wanted it to go, and led it there with my hand." She explained. The sisters were still speechless.

"You make it sound easy." Prue muttered. "How do I use your power, I don't get it."

"Really? It's basically the same as yours." She said, matter-of-factly. "Except, you have to verbally announce it. If an energy ball is coming your way, you have to hold out your hand, yell 'energy ball' then it will orb into your hand and you can do what you want with it."

"Uh-huh." Prue said flatly.

"Cole, are you hurt?" Phoebe said, turning the attention towards her, kneeling over Cole who was on the ground, holding his chest.

"No, I'm fine. Just so many bounty hunters are after me. I didn't think I was going to be able to get away." He struggled to get up and leaned on Phoebe somewhat for support until he was able to rest his back against a wall. "The Underworld is so…messed up right now."

"What do you mean?" Asked Leo.

"I'm not sure. The Source has been restructuring. Shax has been given a list of many witches to kill. But…just specific ones. He's looking for something."

"Any idea what?" Leo asked.

"No. I tried to figure that out…and that's when I got attacked."

"It could be linked to my premonition last night." Phoebe said. Cole nodded his head, having been told about it before he had to leave abruptly in the morning.

"I'll try and go back later, after I rest some."

"No, Cole. You need to just stay here, you're safe here." Phoebe assured him, touching his cheek.

"But you're not, if I'm here." Cole responded.

"They won't hurt us." Phoebe said.

"Well, they will if we don't kill Arjax and get my powers back!" Prue yelled.

"If it's Arjax you want, you'll have to use her as bait." Cole said.

"What does that mean?" Piper asked, placed her arms around Aubrey's shoulders, tightly.

"He was sent to kill her, right? Her powers being used would let him know where you guys are." All the sisters looked at each other. "What?" Cole asked, responded the awkward exchange in looks.

"Prue sort of has her powers now. An Elder exchanged them to keep Aubrey safe." Phoebe answered.

"Well, Prue, you're going to have to use them then."

"If I can get them to work." Prue muttered under her breath.

"Well, let's work on this vanquishing potion first and then we'll go from there." Piper said.

-

A couple of hours went by of constant struggle for Prue. Trying to get a feel for someone else's powers weren't easy, for her at least. She got a few orbs on one object, but nothing that would constitute as her "using" the power. She was also developing a headache. She tied her long, dark hair into a pony-tail and began practicing again, trying to orb the remote to their television from the table to the couch.

"Remote!" She yelled, holding her hand open. But nothing. "UH!" She grunted. Aubrey watched in silence, offering help when she could, but she felt like Prue was only getting angrier each time Aubrey tried to help.

Piper, Phoebe, Cole, and Leo walked out of the kitchen; the witches holding full viles of potions.

"Any progress?" Piper asked, facing Prue, though the question was more for Aubrey. She shook her head quickly, Prue ignored them.

"Well, we have the potions ready, so when he comes we won't be unprepared." Phoebe said.

"What about the chant?" Leo asked.

"Right here!" Piper said holding up a piece of parchment.

"Remember, don't vanquish right away. Try to freeze him Piper, see what he knows. And then, ya know, vanquish him." Cole said.

"So, what's the plan?" Phoebe asked, looking towards Piper.

"Well," she began.

A bright blue light shone in front of them and appeared in Prue's hand in the shape of a remote. "HA! I did it!" Prue yelled victoriously.

"Prue!" Phoebe yelled in disapproval. And then, like clockwork, Arjax teleported in the room via flame and laughed maniacally.

"I found you!" He yelled.

"Oh…damn it." Prue said, realizing her error of her ways and jumped back towards her sisters. Arjax threw a fireball at them; Cole threw one too, meeting his, causing the sisters and Aubrey to fly back, as well as Arjax.

"Prue! You weren't supposed to actually do it until we were ready." Phoebe said.

"Yeah, okay, it's done. Sue me." She said dismissively. "We need a plan here." She said, raising them all up.

"Well, we were thinking of one, until, yeah!" Phoebe shot back.

"Okay you guys, really. The fighting today NEEDS to stop." Piper yelled. She turned towards Arjax and threw her arms forward. A part of his skin exploded and he flew back into a table in the front room. "Damn it, I meant to freeze him!" she yelled.

He got up and threw another energy ball at them. "Oh, Oh!" Prue yelled in panic. "Energy ball!" She yelled holding up her hand. The energy ball orbed into her hands and she felt herself more horrified, not knowing what to do with it.

"Prue! Throw it!" Leo yelled.

"Oh, right!" she pushed her armed forward causing it to soar through the air and hitting Arjax into the ground. Phoebe ran over to him as he started to rise and kicked him in his head.

"Piper now! Try and freeze him again!" Phoebe yelled.

Piper threw her arms forward once again and successfully froze him. "Yes!" She mused aloud and the sisters walked up to him. Piper twisted her hand like before and unfroze his head. "Hi, remember this?" Piper smiled, Arjax blinked.

"Let me go, Witch!"

"Uh, No. You see us, you see these?" Prue asked, gesturing to the potions, "We'll be giving the orders here."

"Not likely." He muttered.

"Why were you after her?" Phoebe asked.

"Orders from the Source." Arjax answered, they already knew that.

"Yes, but why?" Phoebe pressed on.

"Don't look at me, Witch. I don't ask the Source these questions. He gives me an order, I follow, I live to see another day."

Sadly enough, the sisters knew they weren't going to get anywhere with him. "Just vanquish him." Cole said. "He's a lower level assassin, he doesn't know anything."

"He's probably right." Piper said. She pulled out the parchment and the sisters gathered around her.

Together, they chanted. "Demon of darkness, pain and death; no longer shall you take a breath. If to abate the killing of another, with light we send under!" They each then threw a vile of potion at him, exploding on contact. Arjax screamed in pain as fire and light began to surround him and he exploded.

There was a moments silence to be sure he was gone. "Okay…do I get my powers back now?" Prue yelled upward. And, like before, the lights cascaded out of Prue and into Aubrey and out of Aubrey and back into Prue. Prue closed her eyes took in the normality that she longed for again.

Aubrey lunged forward towards the sisters and hugged them all. "Thank you for saving me." She said.

"Thank you. You helped us find some of the ingredients to that potion." Piper smiled.

"If you guys need anymore help, I don't live too far from here." She offered.

"No, you're a kid. You shouldn't have to worry about these things." Phoebe replied, hugging the girl tightly. "You should be safe now. If something happens, we're only an orb away. Leo will hear you." She said.

"Speaking of which. Leo, can you?"

"Yeah." He said, finished her thought. "I should get you home." He took Aubreys hand and took a few steps back.

"Thank you guys again!" And with that, they orbed out, leaving the Halliwell manor.

-

That night, P3 was buzzing more normal than usual. The business was great, which kept Piper busy most of the evening whilst Prue and Phoebe sat at the bar and drank their free drinks. "One hell of a day huh?" Prue said, sipping the straw of her martini.

"Yeah…" Phoebe replied.

It was an awkward silence between them. They haven't talked about their argument about Cole yet, and they were both thinking about it. But would talking about it make it better? Prue was skeptical before saying, "So…about earlier…"

There was another pause. Phoebe turned to face her. "Yeah…"

"Look, Phoebe. I'm sorry if what I said hurt you. But…I can't be sorry for what I said." Prue spat out.

"Well, don't tiptoe around it, Prue." Phoebe said, surprised at the bluntness of it.

"I'm sorry, I – It's no surprise I don't trust Cole, something just tells me I can't Phoebe. At least not yet. And you can't be mad at me for having these feelings." Prue said.

"Well, you can't be mad at me for disagreeing and believing that Cole isn't evil. He is trying." Phoebe said.

"Well, we're left where we were earlier." Prue said, not budging from her stance on the subject matter.

"Excuse me?" said a soft, velvet like voice. The girls turned and found the girl who have helped Piper not fall last night, standing next to them. "Sorry, I hope I didn't interrupt. But, you're Piper's sisters, right?" she asked.

"Yes." They both replied.

"Ah, good. I'm Paige, I met her yesterday, briefly, but still; I was wondering, is she around?" Paige asked, looking behind the bar.

"Yeah, but she's…everywhere tonight." Prue replied.

"Ah, I see. Well, I wanted to give her this, I picked up an application last night. I just wanted to know if she was interested in some extra help on the weekends." She asked. "So, would you mind?"

"No, not at all." Phoebe smiled.

"Thanks." Paige returned the smile. Phoebe placed her hand on the application and her eyes shut tightly. Her stomach began to tie in knots; a premonition was coming. In shades of black and white, a scene began forming behind her eyes. The girl, Paige was on a roof top, seeming very afraid. And then, came a cry of wind and Shax appeared from it, blasting an orb of wind at her, Paige screamed and it all went to white. Phoebe's eyes opened and Paige was gone. Her hand was glued to the application.

"Phoebe, Phoebe!" Prue yelled, moving to the front of her sister. "What did you see?"

"I saw that demon, who almost killed you – Shax. I saw Shax, attacking that girl." Phoebe said.

"Who? Paige?" Prue asked, confused. She looked around but Paige was out of sight.

"Yeah. He was after her. I think she is his next target." Phoebe looked at Prue with concerned eyes and looked down at the application. Hopefully it had an address, they would need to get Paige and protect her from the grizzly fate Prue and Piper almost endured.


	3. Witchy Situation

Charmed: ReWitched

Season 4 Episode 3

Witchy Situation

It was very late in San Francisco, and yet, no lights were dwindled in the Halliwell Manor. Prue and Phoebe sat up together in the living room, quiet, motionless; waiting for some answer to come to them. Phoebe's premonition didn't make sense. Why was the Source after a girl who was seemingly innocent? What was so special about her to him? All of these questions flooded the sister's minds. Prue looked up towards the grandfather clock in the corner; it was a little past midnight. They were waiting for Piper to get home from the club early, but on a Saturday, it seemed unlikely.

"Do you want some coffee or anything?" Prue offered, standing up from the couch, feeling the weight of the night growing on her.

"No." Phoebe said, starring at the same spot on the floor she had been for hours. "I'm fine." There was still obvious tension between the two sisters. They were just somehow able to set it aside for now. But both of them were thinking about their fight earlier that day, about Cole, who was also gone.

Prue walked out of the living room and crossed the entrance to the home just as Piper came bursting the through the door and slammed it shut. "Okay, what's the big emergency!" She talked as if she was out of breath. Prue turned and faced Piper, Phoebe appeared out of the corner of the room and stood very still. "What?" Piper grunted, "Is someone dead?"

"No." Phoebe answered. "Not yet, anyway; If we have anything to say about it, that is."

Piper looked at Prue, in hopes of her older sister deciphering the cryptic message. "What does that mean?" she demanded. "It's late, I can't handle mind games."

"Well," Prue began, "Phoebe had a premonition about that girl who saved you from falling the other day, Paige." Piper's facial expression changed from confusion to immediate concern. "Paige handed in an application to Phoebe to give to you and once Phoebe touched it, she saw Shax…killing her."

"Oh no…" Piper said in a low voice. "Are you sure? Have you talked to Leo about -"

"Yeah." Phoebe interrupted. "We told him instantly. We got her address from her application, but it's late and we didn't know what to say to her…otherwise we would have gone over there ourselves. Leo is keeping an eye on her, checking to see if there is anything supernatural about her and in case Shax does come after her, he can orb her out of the way."

"So…all we can do is wait?" Piper asked. The other two sisters nodded in agreement. Piper looked disappointed and she held out her hand towards Phoebe, "Do you have the application?"she asked.

"Yeah, why?" Phoebe asked.

"Well I'll call her in for an interview tomorrow, since she did genuinely want to work for me. At least then we can keep an eye on her personally." Piper said, Prue look at Piper and then to Phoebe and nodded her head. Phoebe turned, walked back into the living room and grabbed the application. She handed it to Piper who took it all too quickly and began reading it thoroughly.

"What?" Prue had asked.

"I'm checking her job experience," she answered quickly. "She's an assistant in a social worker firm?" Piper looked up for reassurance. Both of them nodded. "God…that sounds…great. Why is the source after her again? She seems rather mundane compared to usual targets."

"Unfortunately we're still not quite sure." Prue answered, folding her arms.

"Well, I guess we'll just have to wait until tomorrow until we can do anything or if Leo comes back and says something otherwise." Piper said.

"Yeah, or Cole." Phoebe added.

"Cole?" Piper asked. "Cryptic again." She grunted.

"Well, he's on the run again, tonight…" She said in dismay. "But, he said if he could that he would check around for why the Source is hunting this Paige girl." Phoebe answered. Prue didn't look at Phoebe as she talked about Cole, instead she headed up the stairs.

"Where are you going?" Piper asked.

"To bed. Like you said, there isn't much we can do tonight. And we'll be no good to this innocent exhausted." She yawned. Empathizing with her sister, Piper nodded and headed towards the stairs too before turning back to look at Phoebe. "Hey, you coming?"

"Umm. Yeah, I'll be going to bed shortly." Phoebe responded.

"Alright, don't stay up too late. Love you." Piper called back, halfway up the stairs.

"Love you too. Good night!" Phoebe clasped her hands together and looked around the manor, not really sure what she was looking for exactly. She knew Cole probably wasn't going to come home tonight, but she had hoped. She had hoped that things would somehow turn normal between them for once. That he could hold her in his arms every night like people who love each other do. But as long as Cole was a demon, who betrayed his own kind, she didn't see it possible.

Feeling a sudden draft, she began rubbing her arms with her hands and turned towards the stairs, walking to her bedroom. As she crawled into bed, an overwhelming feeling of loneliness swept over her. Cole's side of the bed was empty; usually he had been home for the nights. But she assumed that he was trying his hardest to get back home.

"Good Night, Cole." She whispered, reaching her arm out towards her lamp, turned the switch and turned it off. She cuddled with his pillow and allowed herself to drift into a deep sleep.

The next morning came quickly. There weren't enough hours for sleep for the Halliwell sisters. Prue walked into the kitchen to find Piper holding a cup of coffee and eating a bagel. She looked over as Prue made her entrance and gave a half smile.

"Good Morning." She said with her mouth half full.

"You too." Prue replied, reaching for the coffee pot and pouring herself a glass. "Any word from Leo?" she asked, noticing his absence.

"No, not yet. But I'm sure he'll be here eventually." Piper was hopeful.

"Phoebe's still asleep." Prue commented.

"Let her sleep. The tension going on between you guys isn't bearable. I need a break." Piper walked over, took the coffee pot from Prue and refilled her cup. Prue just starred and didn't say anything.

"We'll get through it." Prue seemed sure of herself. "We always do."

"Prue, I think it's more delicate this time. This is the man that Phoebe loves…" Piper began. She walked over to the table and sat down. "I just think that we need to let Phoebe be Phoebe…it's her choice to be with him."

"I just don't trust him." She muttered. "He's still a demon. I fear that eventually he'll get tired of running and try to turn his backs on us, when we're not expecting it."

"Well, there have always been risks with love."

"This isn't the same thing. It would affect all of us." Prue joined her at the table, sitting across from Piper.

"That is true." Piper agreed. "But, Phoebe seems to be sure that won't happen. If you can't trust him, can you at least trust her?" Prue didn't say anything. Piper took her sister's silence as a small victory.

"I just don't like him, Piper."

"You don't have to. That's okay." She knew she was making a breakthrough, and with Prue, this was a big deal. "But her being with him, or in love with him, is not your choice. And it's not fair to keep punishing her for it."

Prue rolled her eyes and got up from the table, Alright, alright, alright." She said over and over again, "slack; cutting her some, now."

Just then, Phoebe, who looked as if she didn't sleep at all, walked into the kitchen and Prue and Piper got quiet. Phoebe froze and tip toed around the kitchen.

"Did I just interrupt something?" Phoebe asked.

"No, of course not." Prue answered. Phoebe looked up in surprise that it was Prue who responded, instead of Piper.

"Okay…" she didn't know how to respond to that, and decided to change the subject. "Where's –" A bright shimmering of white and blue lights flew in through the windows and began formed Leo. Phoebe caught herself before she finished her question. "Ah, there he is. Of course." She said, turning back to grab a glass to pour water in it.

"Hi honey!" Piper said, getting up from the table and giving him a hug. She learned upward and kissed his lips like she hadn't seen him in days. She fell back on her heels and smiled.

"I missed you too." He muttered to her with a smile.

"Well isn't this cute." Phoebe laughed. "I feel like I'm watching some kind of…daytime sitcom." She looked at Prue who nodded in agreement.

"So, uh, Leo did you find anything while at Paige's?" Prue got to the point.

"No." he answered. "Nothing out of the ordinary anyway; she watched television, talked on the phone to her uncle. Took a shower…"

"WHAT?!" Piper exclaimed, cocking her right eyebrow upward.

"I didn't look! I was just filling in the specifics." Leo responded, alarmed.

"Aha, you see, you didn't have to be that specific." Piper groaned.

"Piper…" Prue shook her head. "Leo, did you find anything that would shed some light on as to why the Source would want her?"

Leo shook his head. "No."

"Well, the pieces just don't seem to fit." Prue added.

"I know; Leo, there has to be something. Why would the Source have Shax try to kill her?" Phoebe argued. Leo shook his head again. "Do you think he's after her?"

"Why would you think that?" Prue asked.

"Well, Cole did say that the Source was looking for something. And it's obvious he hasn't found it yet, because if he did, we'd probably know it by now…in some way."

"Well, maybe not." Leo said. Phoebe looked at him with confusion, "Your premonitions haven't always been right before…right?"

"Are you serious right now?" Phoebe spat back, feeling both hurt and offended. "I know what I saw. She's in trouble, and if we don't figure out why the Source wants her, she'll die, Leo."

"Alright, Phoebe just…calm down." Piper began. "Leo, I have to agree with Phoebe. The last 3 years we've learned many things, and one of those things is that everything happens for a reason."

"Yeah. And…maybe they're connected." Prue chimed in. The other three turned towards her.

"What do you mean?" Leo had asked.

"What if Phoebe's two premonitions are connected. Think about it, those are the only premonitions she's had since we got back from the Underworld. The evil secret; then Paige's death, maybe they're connected somehow."

Leo tensed up, "I don't know Prue. Maybe I should talk to the Elders."

"No! I mean," Piper put her hand in front of Prue's face and stopped her from talking.

"Yes, Leo, go ask them. Go, go." Piper ordered, with that, Leo orbed out leaving a very confused Phoebe and equally frustrated Prue.

"Uh, okay, mind telling me what that was about?" Prue demanded.

"He wasn't being much help, I think I'm going to call her. Ask her to swing by the house for an interview, that way we can observe her together and maybe try to determine something." Piper walked out of the kitchen and into the living room where she had set Paige's application earlier that morning. Prue and Phoebe followed.

"How are we going to do that?" Phoebe asked.

"I'm not sure yet. First thing is first, let's just get her here." Piper reached for the application and began skimming it for her phone number. She reached for the phone and began dialing, she waved Prue and Phoebe away with one hand as the call began ringing.

After the third or fourth ring, a soft, velvet voice finally answered, "Hello?" Piper hesitated and didn't say anything. Paige repeated herself, "Hello?" with more fervor in her voice.

"Oh, sorry; Paige Matthews?" Piper asked formally.

"Yes, who is this?" she responded, slightly reluctant.

"This is Piper Halliwell calling about your application to P3" Piper began, feeling more comfortable with the conversation.

"Oh, hello!" Paige responded with enthusiasm. "Yes, sorry, I thought you might have been one of those solicitors." She laughed anxiously.

"Oh, no. Definitely not…one of them. But, hey, what are you doing around 3:00 this afternoon?"

--

The Halliwells were patient with awaiting Paige's arrival that afternoon. It wasn't too much longer until that girl, who for some reason the source wanted dead, would be there. Out of all of the sisters, Phoebe was the most apprehensive. Breaking the silence in a most undesirable way, Prue's cell abruptly began going off. She ran over to it and looked at the caller I.D. a little amazed that he work was actually calling her on a Sunday.

"Prue?" Piper asked, taking notice to Prue's look of surprise.

"Yeah, uh. One minute," she said before flipping open her phone. "Hello?" she answered.

"Prue, how are you?" Mr. Jones asked, sounding very enthused.

"I'm fine, enjoying my _weekend_." She responded.

"Ah, yes. Sorry to bother you, but I need you to come by the studio today. There is a client of mine that I'm having one of my journalists write about, and I need you to take the photo's for it."

Prue bit her lip, could she really say no to her boss? "With all do respect Mr. Jones…"

"The print goes out in the morning, it needs to be done today." He pressed harder.

"Yeah, but, I mean, isn't there anyone else that can…" at this point, Prue knew she was fighting a lost battle. Her boss wouldn't have called her if he intended someone else to do it. Before she could finish her argument she grunted and finally withdrew herself and agreed, "Yeah, alright. I'll be there in twenty or so minutes."

"Good. See you then." Without saying good bye, Prue closed her phone and turned to her sisters where looking outraged.

"Okay, what? I didn't have a choice. I have to go in, take a few quick pictures, and I'll be back. Promise." She walked over to her camera, laying on the dining room table and brought it over to her bag and placed it carefully inside.

"Prue, don't you think this is more important?" Phoebe said, following her.

"Phoebe, it's my job. Besides, you're the one who gets premonitions; you're the one we need around her."

"Not the point."

"I'll be back as soon as I can, I promise. She reached for her little sister, hugged her, kissed her fore head and took off for the front door. "Piper, I'll be back!" she closed the door before making out Pipers returning remark. She ran down the large steps that led to the manor and turned right, sharply, and got into her car, pulled out of the driveway, and turned onto the main road.

Nearly ten minutes later, speeding, Prue finally arrived at the studio where she had worked. She pulled up in a front parking spot, parked slightly crooked and got out, running into the studio.

As soon as she walked in, she crossed through the narrow hallway and entered her bosses open office. There was another man in there, wearing glasses, faded brown hair, about 40 years in age. "Prue Halliwell, meet Ben Matthews." The man stood up from his chair and held out his hand to shake hers.

"How do you do?" he asked with a smile.

Prue hesitated and shook his hand back, smiling. "I'm good. Thank you."

"Ben Matthews has given countless money to charities all around. We have the story all we need is a few great pictures." Mr. Jones said, looking at Prue.

"Well, I'm sure we'll get some great ones." Prue responded. "If you'll follow me to the main studio." She instructed, leading him out of the office.

Once Prue had everything finally set up, she felt more comfortable and she knew time would fly by. He was having a little trouble taking a good photo, however, no matter how hard Prue tried. "Why don't you tell me about why you donate so much money?" Prue asked, trying to sound interested in his work.

"Well, really, my niece, Paige is the reason." He answered. Prue lowered the camera. "Is something wrong?"

"Paige…Matthews?" Prue asked.

"Why yes, she works at a social workers firm." Prue almost felt like she was going to have an out of body experience. This was a completely strange coincidence. "Do you know her?" he asked.

"Uh no – yes, yes I do; sort of." Her answer was really muddled, Ben was growing slightly confused. "She's interviewing with my sister for a job at my sister's club; P3."

"Oh, I've heard of that club. I heard it's awesome." He said mild enthusiasm. He was in his forties; P3 probably wasn't the place for him.

"So, she's your niece?" Prue asked, casually, hoping to get any additional information without seeming eager.

"Yeah; well technically, my adopted niece; my brother and his wife adopted her while she was only a few months old." He began. Prue became very interested, having to catch herself when she wasn't shooting her camera at all. "But, they passed away a few years ago, too. A drunk driver." He said, somberly.

"Oh, I'm so sorry." Prue sympathized.

"It's okay. Paige is doing great. I don't know what kind of parent would want to give her up. She truly is an angel." Prue smiled. Why would the Source want to kill her then? Is she a future whitelighter? Or Elder? Is she supposed to do some kind of good?

But even so, that wouldn't fit with Phoebe's premonition. An evil secret that could corrupt the family. What would that mean? Prue had to think on it for a second. Paige was adopted, and her eyes were brown, like her mothers. Her eyes were also dark like her mothers. Prue was the only exception in the family, having blue eyes. She did resemble her mother a lot, but not her father.

Prue caught herself in mid-thought. Why was she even thinking this? She and Paige were not related. It wasn't possible. After a few more minutes of shooting, Prue closed her camera and smiled. "We're all done here Mr. Matthews." She said, shaking his hand. "I'm sure the article will be great."

"Thank you so much."

"No, thank you." She smiled. Once he left, she walked to Mr. Jones office, set the film on his desk and left. He would develop them.

Quickly, she ran to her car and got in; it had been a little over an hour that she had been gone. Her sisters would be furious. But, she could tell them her theory on Paige, but what would they think? Truly, they would assume that Prue was crazy. A lost sister; it simply wouldn't make sense. Gramms and her mother would have told them about her if she had another child.

Once they had gotten back, an unfamiliar car, a green Volkswagen, was parked in front of the house. No doubt Paige's car. Prue pulled up in her spot in the driveway and hurried into the manor. She opened the door and saw her sisters and Paige standing in front of the stairwell. By the looks of it Paige was getting ready to leave and for some reason, Phoebe had locked arms with her.

"Well, look who's home." Phoebe announced, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, sorry I'm late." She said, excusing herself, "Photoshoot." She walked over to Piper who had just held out her hand to Paige.

"Looks like I'll be seeing you next Friday." She said with a smile. Paige met her hand and shook it in reply.

"Thank you so much."

"Uh, Piper." Prue began, walking up to her sister, "We need to -" just as Prue set her hand on Pipers shoulder, the chandelier began to glow brightly; it never worked. The blue light shone over the four of them. Paige flinched and the sisters looked at each other in utter confusion; more so than Paige.

"What was that?" Paige freaked out.

"Ummm, institutional lighting…" Piper lied, badly. Not knowing what else to believe, Paige nodded her head and began to head for the door. And then, behind Phoebe, three puffs of a smoke filtered the air and formed three women with dark markings on their bodies; their outfits resembled tribal wear and they each had only three fingers. One of them struck down Phoebe which caused a thud, Paige turned and jumped back.

"Paige, get out of her now." Prue yelled, while Piper slinked off to Phoebe, helping her up. One of the women dodged passed Prue and headed straight for Paige.

"Who are they?!" Paige asked, backing up.

"Hey! Stay away from her!" Prue swung her hand and the women went flying into the other room. Paige stood there, dumbfounded.

"Did you…just?"

"Paige, run! Go!" Piper yelled, and without a second warning, Paige ran out of the manor and slammed the door shut.

"Piper, freeze them!" Phoebe yelled, kicking one of them away. Piper pushed her hands forward, but nothing happened.

"They're immune to my power!" she yelled in fear. She ducked behind Phoebe who kicked the demonic woman back again.

"Try blowing her up!" Prue called, sending the other girl flying into a wall. Piper repeated the gesture she made moments ago and the demon in front of them blew up.

"Ha!" Piper smiled, "They weren't immune to that power." The remaining two demons gathered together.

"The evil doesn't linger here no more." One of them said.

"Let us go." Said the other. And with the same puff of smoke, they were gone. Prue, Piper, and Phoebe starred at each other in a moment of silence, making sure they were in fact gone.

"Okay…what the hell was that about? Who were they?" Piper yelled as the sisters came closer together.

"I don't know. But it seemed like they were more interested in Paige." Phoebe answered.

"We really gotta demon proof this house, because they can't just be – hey!" Piper yelled in protest as Cole just shimmered into the manor. "Don't do that! I'll blow you up next time!"

Cole, who seemed confused, turned to Phoebe, wrapped his arms around her immediately and kissed her.

"You couldn't have been here two minutes earlier?" Piper said in protest.

"What do you mean?" he asked, still looking at Phoebe as if he hadn't seen her in days.

"We were attacked, by these demon girls." Phoebe answered.

"From Hell!" Piper added.

"They appeared in puffs of smoke and" Just then, before Piper could explain it thoroughly, Leo orbed in right beside her, causing her jump once more. "LEO!" she roared.

"Sorry, but the Elders wanted me to come down here immediately. They think furies were going to attack you guys." He said.

"Furies, that's it." Cole answered.

"What? Furies? Like the dog-faced women from hell?" Prue asked.

"Yeah, well, basically. They seek out true evil and try to kill it."

"Well, that doesn't make much sense. Do the furies not know who live here?" Phoebe asked.

"Well, I don't think it's you they're after." Cole qualified. The sisters shook their heads, not knowing what that meant. "When I was down there, I found out that the Source was after that girl."

"He wanted to kill her?" Phoebe asked with a shrill voice.

"No, quite the opposite. He wanted to capture her."

"Why?" Leo asked.

"Apparently, she would be valuable to him. He believes that she has part of your blood in her." The sisters and Leo didn't say anything. What could be said? Prue thought back at how not even an hour ago she believed that Paige and her were related.

"Cole, that's crazy. That would have to mean that she was related to us. And Mom had no siblings so that would make her…"

"Our sister." Prue finished Piper's sentence. "No, it sort of makes sense." Prue began, "The person I had a photoshoot with today, was Paige's uncle. Apparently, she was adopted at a young age. Her parents weren't her birth parents."

"What?" Phoebe asked, feeling faint.

"Prue, would you listen to yourself, that's not possible. Mom would have told us if we had another sister!" Piper argued.

"But think about it Piper, doesn't she look a lot like mom? And her name, Piper, it starts with a P!" Prue's statement made Piper think for a moment, her eyes glazing over. The P name was a tradition in the halliwell line for the women.

"Prue…"

"That doesn't make sense." Phoebe said. "If she had our blood in her, than wouldn't the Source want to kill her? And how does that work? The Charmed Ones are the Power of Three…not four!"

"Well, I don't think she is…your full sister." Cole added. They all looked at him. "The Source believes there is a darker side to her…a side her can manipulate more naturally." They all felt they knew where he was going with this, and then, abruptly, Piper stormed for the stairs, running up them.

"Piper, where are you going?" Leo yelled.

"To get to the bottom of this." She yelled back. Fearful of what that meant, they all chased after her. They had reached the attic and Piper was tearing open the pages of the Book of Shadows. She finally got to the page she wanted and went to light five candles in a circle.

"Piper, what are you doing?" Prue asked with a concerned tone, looking down at the open page.

"I'm going to ask Gramms." Piper said, matter-of-factly.

"Gramms?" Phoebe reiterated in disbelief.

"Yes."

"But I don't think that's a good…"

"HERE THESE WORDS," she began chanting over Phoebe, "here my cries spirit on the other side. Come to me, I summon there; Cross now the great DIVIDE." She slammed her hands on the book and a shimmering golden light illuminated the room. Their grandmother appeared, in a transparent state.

"Piper? Phoebe, Prue?" she asked, also taking notice of Cole and Leo standing next to them. "What is this about?"

"Gramms," Piper began with a fake smile, "Why does the Source think he can corrupt us with a girl who might have Charmed blood?" Piper was really anxious for the answer, as were everyone else. Gramms bit her lip and began shaking her head.

"I don't – I don't know what you're talking about." She replied.

"Uh-huh, you see Gramms," Phoebe began, "You were a terrible liar when you were alive. And now that you're dead, you're worse!" At this point, Gramms felt backed into a corner and it was obvious that she was keeping something from them.

"Gramms!" Prue yelled.

"I can't; I was swore to secrecy." She finally admitted.

"By who?" Piper asked, accusingly.

Then, a calm, ethereal voice echoed through the room, "By me." The voice said. Another set of golden lights appeared and took the form of their mother. The sisters admired their mothers beauty in death.

"Mom?" Phoebe gasped.

"My girls," the regret exuding from her words was penetrable to the sisters. "There is something that I never should have not told you."

"Patty…" Gramms said.

"No, mom." She turned to face the three girls again, "We agreed not to tell anyone because there would be reprisals. Afraid that you girls would be denied your powers, your birthright. It happened nearly after your father and I had divorced. I was angry, vengeful, and trying to take it out on any demons I could…but then, I wasn't as powerful as I thought I was…" it almost seemed like tears were forming from her eyes. "A very powerful demon, encountered me, tortured me."

"Patty, don't…" Gramms placed her hand on her daughters shoulder.

"He raped me." She finally got out. The sisters were in disbelief, completely dumbstruck. Patty knew that would be the result and tried to continued. "When Sam, my whitelighter at the time, eventually found me, it had already happened. He took me, healed me, but then, I could feel something inside of me, unnatural; dark." Phoebe looked at Cole. She wondered if she would feel the same if she and Cole ever tried to have children.

"Naturally, after finding out what happened, we couldn't tell the Elders, they would have been furious. So, Patty drank a potion of mine that bound the babies powers. And from then on, it just seemed and felt like a natural thing." Grams said, trying to make the blow a bit smoother.

"You girls were only toddlers; you just thought mommy got a little fat." She tried to smile, "you never knew I was pregnant." Prue and Pipers mouths had dropped. Cole was starring at Phoebe, Leo starring at Piper. Finally Phoebe turned to them, "We wanted to keep the baby. After the demonic side seemed to have been bound, she would have been a normal little girl. But…if the secret got out…or is something went wrong."

"The result would have been disastrous." Gramms finished.

"After the baby was born, we took her to a local church, and they found her a good home." Regret was in every syllable of her sentence.

All fell silent. Nothing more needed to be said. Prue was right. Paige had looked like their mother because she was part of her mother; part of them. A fourth sister? None of them could believe it.

"Wait a minute. Are you telling me that that girl...our innocent is really" she couldn't get the phrase out. "Our sister?"

"Your baby sister." Patty replied a moment later.

"Your baby half sister." Gramms said.

"But by my half, which makes her a sister witch. Half witch." She said, enthused.

"Half demon." Prue finished.

Piper turned to Leo, "Is that even possible?!" she yelled, outraged.

"Yes…well. I don't see why not. But…such breeds are forbidden and often put to death."

"Such breeds? She's a human!" Phoebe said with a rage that she didn't know where it came from. Leo didn't say anything. He was clearly in disbelief of it too.

"Mom…" Prue hadn't been looking at them and finally looked up, piercing her mothers deep brown eyes, "Why did you lie to us?"

"Oh…honey. I di – didn't mean to keep this from you."

"Does she have powers?" Piper asked, flatly.

"Well, yes. She would be bound as long as I was alive, and well…" Gramms made a gesture with her hands, moving up and down her body, signifying she was in fact dead. "She would have any of your powers, or some variation of them. Or even a combination of three…altered with a demonic ability."

"My guess is, she hadn't used them yet." Piper said with brief disgust.

"Well, they wouldn't actively appear unless she was aware of them or if she encountered you, together." Patty said. Prue, Piper, and Phoebe looked at each other. All of them had encountered Paige, and the chandelier glowing a sign that Paige might have come into her powers.

"We did meet her." Prue said. Gramms and Patty looked each other with worried expressions.

"The Source wants her." Prue said. "Why?"

"Well, since she's half demon, he's partly like her. He can manipulate the side of her that is demonic."

"So she's part evil?" Leo asked, walking over to Piper, placing his hands on her tense shoulders.

"No, she doesn't have to be. That would be her choice. Because she's half demon, it doesn't make her half evil; you aren't born evil." Patty defended.

"Mom…we can't have a demon in the family." Piper said. "You can't just come in here after all of these years and say, 'Oh hey, by the way, you have a sister!'"

"I know it's a lot to deal with right now, Piper; the best way you know how. Learning about a new sister…almost losing Phoebe…it's a lot to deal with. But you're going to have to deal with it. But don't fight it…it'll consume you."

Prue, Piper, and Phoebe were all at a loss for words, still. Anger and confusion were the dominant emotions swelling inside of them.

"Come on, patty." Gramms said with remorse. "The rest is up to them." Gramms took Patty's hand together they shimmered away with golden luminescence, leaving the sisters very confused about the secret they had just learned.

--

Hours later, they had finally come down from the attic. Venting to each other about the new secret. At last, Phoebe's premonition made sense. The evil secret was their new half-sister, Paige. Who was also, half-demon. How could they ever accept that? Would they be able to accept her.

"I'm going to see what I can find out about the Source's move. If Paige has come into her powers, he'll know. And Shax will know where to strike." Cole leaned down to kiss Phoebe and finally shimmered out.

Walking down to the main floor, Piper patted Leo on the shoulder, "can you sense her?"

"No." Leo admitted, "She's still too new." As they got to the bottom of the stairs, they all paused. The front door was open and Paige stood in front of them, innocent.

"I – uh – I'm sorry, the door was open and I just…" she was startled.

Phoebe rushed to her side and pulled her closer. Piper, Prue, and Leo were frozen on the stairs. Prue looked at her, but it was hard to see her as her sister. Piper felt the same way.

"Look, I don't know what happened earlier, but ever since, I've been feeling very strange." Paige spoke up. All of them continued to stare, out of awkwardness, she tried not to look at them back. "Does this kind of stuff happen to you…a lot?"

"Yeah." Prue stated, simply, pushing her hair out of her face.

Then, the puffs of smoke returned once more and appeared behind Paige. This time Piper noticed in time, "Prue!" she yelled. Prue swung her hand and sent of them flying into the other and knocking them down.

"Those things again!" Paige yelled, Phoebe pushed Paige aside, levitated in the air and kicked them both in the heads as they rose from the ground. Phoebe landed and Paige looked more shocked than before. "What did you – how did you?"

The manor doors blasted open with a large gust of wind, and Shax appeared out of nowhere, looking straight at Paige. He thrusted his arm forward sending a ball of wind straight for it.

"NO!" Prue shouted. And then Paige flinched and her whole body began to shake and finally shimmered out of place, missing the gust of wind, barely. Prue, Piper, and Leo jumped out of the way just in time to evade it. Paige shimmered back in and looked around at her body with a terror shaping all over her face. Her hands were trembling. Shax threw another ball of wind and Prue waved her hand it, sending it towards the Furies, who were then vanquished.

"Good shot, Prue!" Phoebe called. Shax then spun around and unleashed a gust of wind, sending them all to the ground. Leo quickly got up and jumped on Shax's back.

"You girls, Get Paige out of here!" He yelled, struggling to stay on the demons back.

Phoebe grabbed Paiges hand and ran after Prue and Piper to the attic. "Come on, it's the only way!" Phoebe yelled. Once they got inside the attic, Prue swung her hand towards the door and closed it. The three sisters ran towards the book and began flipping the pages to Shax's vanquishing spell. Paige, taking notice of the book gasped.

"Come, where is that spell…" Prue was turned the pages in anxiety.

"What are you guys? Witches?" Paige asked in shock.

"Yes…and so are you." Phoebe said with a half smile.

"Sort of." Piper qualified.

The attic door burst open and Shax appeared, in front of Paige. He was forming another ball of wind in his hand. Paige looked at it in panic. "What is that?" She held out her hand, as if to protect herself from it. "A ball of wind?" the wind ball then shimmered from Shax to Paige's extended arm, floating next to her hand.

The sisters looked in shock. "Did she…just?"

"Ah!" Paige said, extending her arm back and forward again, out of instinct, throwing it at Shax, causing him to be immobilized by his own ability.

"Here it is, now!" Prue yelled.

Together, the sisters began to chant. "Evil wind that blows, that which formed below, no longer may you dwell, death takes you with this spell." Shax spun around in place, roaring in pain until finally combusting into a green light that caused Paige to fall back. Prue and Piper ran to help her up and Phoebe stood in front of her.

"Are you okay?" she asked with genuine worry. Paige starred at all of them, her mouth dropped completely and she pushed herself away from them and headed towards the attic doorway.

"What have you turned me into?" she said, fear enveloped all over her body. She ran down the stairs and the sisters grouped together closely. Phoebe tried to run after her and Prue and Piper pulled her back.

"No…" Piper said.

Phoebe didn't understand. "Let her go." Prue added. "She's not ready to hear the truth…yet." The three sisters starred out of their open attic feeling a great loss even though they had won the battle. Shax was vanquished, but he wasn't the bigger problem. Their half-sister would be hunted by the side of darkness. Their half-sister in which one half, that they weren't sure how dominant was, was demonic. The oracle in Phoebe's vision was right. A secret could, and did, slowly begin to corrupt their family.


	4. Charmed, I'm sure

Charmed: ReWitched

Season 4 Episode 4

Charmed, I'm sure

The next morning came with uneasy tension throughout the entire manor. Prue was in the attic, thumbing through the pages of the Book of Shadows, trying to find out if her new half-sisters breed was listed. The thought of having another sister was far too odd. Prue didn't know Paige and yet, because of her mother's secret, the Charmed One's would be forced to deal with a lie that not only put their lives in danger, but also Paige's. Prue assumed that being half-demon made Paige her own worst enemy. Finally, she closed the book finding nothing. It must have been really rare.

Before last night Prue never imagined that kind of combination possible. Luckily, she was part witch, which did give her some hope. Piper and Phoebe opened the door to the attic and stepped in. They both shared the same uneasy expression that Prue had, which meant they were all feeling a combination of the same thing.

"Did you find anything, Prue?" Piper sat down on the couch behind the Book of Shadows. Prue shook her head. Piper had already assumed that to be the answer. "Well, what do we do?" she had asked. Prue and Phoebe looked at her confused. Was there something to be done? An exact objective?

"About what?" Prue formed fists with her hands, tensely, and then released them.

"Well, we have to find Paige." Prue winced at Pipers response. "She's probably freaking out."

"No more than us." Phoebe commented. "What do we even say to her? 'Hi, we're your half-sisters from a long line of witches; except you're also part demon, which we vanquish almost every day.' I mean…really, Piper?"

"I know Phoebe. But it's different with her. She's going through this alone. We had each other at least and the book…and Grams…in her own way." Piper was stumbling on her words and the point, "Look…whether we like it or not…Paige is our sister, our baby sister."

"Baby-half sister." Prue corrected. "Look, I want to help her to. But this is all too soon. I don't know about you guys but I need a little bit more time to soak in what just happened with our lives." Prue's voice was getting louder.

"Hey." The sisters eyes shifted to the entrance of the attic where Leo was standing in between the doors threshold.

"Leo!" Leo walked over to Piper and returned the gesture of a hug when she held out her arms for him. "Is she alright?" Piper asked. Prue and Phoebe looked at him in curiosity.

"I guess fine is one way to describe how she's feeling." His vague response gave them the general idea without him explaining. "But, there's a bigger issue here…" there was different tone in his voice, almost afraid.

"Leo, what is it?" Piper slid her hand through his hair and met his eyes with hers.

"The Elders can't know what Paige really is." Leo said. The girls looked at him almost astounded, not about keeping something from the Elders, but for Leo to suggest it. The question of 'why' was apparent on all of their faces. "This has only happened a number of times. And I've researched this rare breed of life; it's very dangerous. And each time the Elders had found out, they exterminated them."

"So the Elders would kill Paige?" Phoebe asked.

"If they found out. And seeing as how the half-witch comes from the Charmed line, then definitely." A sudden veil of anxiety was cast over the room. How were they to keep Paige's identity a secret for long? Especially if she was to be in the Charmed One's lives.

"So, what do we do? Just leave her alone?" Phoebe was starring blank into the distance as she asked.

"No, she's still our sister Phoebe." Piper pressed. "This isn't fair for her. I don't like this situation anymore than any of you guys do but it's unfair to just leave her in the dark just because it's going to be hard."

"Piper, there is just a lot more to this than it seems." Prue sighed.

"No Prue, she's our sister. And sisters protect each other." There was a dead silence afterward and more growing tension. Before the sisters could get another word in Cole had shimmered against the back window. Phoebe rushed to him upon sight and embraced him, kissing him fiercely for a moment and then stepping back.

"Hi Phoebe." He whispered, grinning. He looked up at the other three in the room who were forced the spectate the lip-lock and he stepped back immediately putting on a more professional demeanor. "Have you guys talked to Peggie?" All three of the sisters looked at him trying to comprehend who he was talking about.

"You mean Paige?" Piper corrected.

"Yeah. Her. Have you talked to her yet?" Cole asked, dismissing his mistake.

"No. We haven't…it is still the morning. Usually we like to wait until the afternoon before we have to get our hands dirty." Piper replied.

"Why?" Prue asked, more serious.

"Well…things are getting bad." Cole's tone change created a new tension in the room.

"Cole, what does that mean?" Phoebe tightened her grip on his hand.

"It's the Source, I think he's surfaced." The girls became pale.

"Why would you think that?" Leo demanded.

"Because I couldn't feel him in the underworld; I found out some information regarding your sister. Apparently she has a lot more power than you probably give her credit for. She's the reason the Source has surfaced."

"I have to tell the Elders this." Leo said. Prue immediately turned to him and began waving her arms in disapproval.

"Um, Leo the Elders? Yeah – bad idea!" she yelled. "Don't you think the Elders would want to know why the Source had surfaced?" And then Leo was fully aware of repercussions. The Elders would find out about Paige.

"But…they will have to know…" Leo seemed internally conflicted. "The greater good might depend on it."

"But we're not going to just feed our new sister to the lions." Prue protested. She walked over to the book and began flipping the pages.

"What are you looking for?" Piper asked.

"The source has surfaced; surely he wouldn't just be in plain sight so we would need to find him." She flipped through the pages agitatedly not finding a solution. "Ya know." She said, closing the book with an impressive force, "It would be wonderful if we could have some magical assistance." Like a response to her call, the book flipped open and turned to the Enchantment Spell. The other sisters hovered over Prue and book and began reading. They all became puzzled.

"Well this doesn't make any sense. How is this going to help?" asked Piper.

"I still think we should –" Piper quickly placed her hand over Leo's mouth before he could finish the sentence.

"You are not telling the Elders Leo. We need to handle this ourselves." Piper said dismissively and then returned her attention to Prue.

"I think that we're supposed to use this spell to find the source. He's probably hiding and this spell could help us spot him without mistaking him for another person." Prue's reasoning began to make sense. "But, what can we use?" As if a step ahead of her sister Phoebe approached Prue with a pair of sunglasses. Reluctantly taking it, Prue smiled.

"Well, it would work, right?" Phoebe argued. She cleared her throat and took the glasses from Prue, beginning to chant. "_Magic forces far and wide, Enchant these so those can't hide. Allow this witch to use therein, so she can reveal the Evil within." _Phoebe had waited for something to spark or light up but the nothing happened.

"Try them on." Prompted Leo. Phoebe placed the glasses on and looked at Leo unenthused.

"No, nothing." She said anticlimactically.

"How about me?" Cole suggested. Phoebe eyes turned to find the body of Belthazor through the black visors and screamed out of surprise.

She caught her breath and slid the glasses off, "Enchanting."

"Leo! Tell why you're losing control of your orbing _now_?" Piper snapped as the sisters landed uncomfortably on top of each other in the middle of an apparent empty apartment hallway.

"I'm nervous…I really think we should.. ."

"NO! Not an option, Leo. Not right now. We will handle this. Now quiet!" Piper demanded as the sisters gained balance on their feet.

"Alright, now which one is hers?" Prue asked. Reluctantly, Leo pointed to a door at the end of the hall. "Right." Prue led her sisters to the doorway and knocked on it twice.

"Coming!" Paiges voice called from behind the closed door.

"So, what should we say to her?" Phoebe asked. Piper and Prue froze and looked at each other and then back to Phoebe. "So we came here with nothing to say?!"

"Well we're here to check on her." Prue argued.

"Okay, can we explain that to her?" Phoebe shot back. The door opened with an enthused smile on her face until she realized who was at the door. The smile soon faded into an expression of indifference.

And it was silent.

"Hi." Prue said boldly. Paige folded her arms and responded

"Hi." Paige replied. More silence followed.

"Look, we're sorry to barge in on you like this but we wanted to…ya know." Piper's attempt at breaking the ice wasn't working.

"What?" Paige demanded.

"We wanted to know if you were okay." Phoebe finally added in.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be? Everything is perfectly normal." Paige folded her arms.

"Well, she's a bad liar like Gramms." Piper deduced. "Listen sister," Paige was immediately taken back by the term 'sister'. "We are trying, you might be in danger. There is a very powerful demon - -" Paige began waving her arms and signaled Piper to stop talking, quickly marched behind them all and shoved them inside her apartment, closing the door quickly.

"What, are you guys crazy or something? Don't go talking like that so loud around here, I have neighbors you know!" Paige was fuming. "You shouldn't have come here!"

"We were worried about you." Phoebe said, trying to calm the tension.

"Well you shouldn't be. I'm fine. And I was even more perfectly fine before you guys came in and made me something. . .terrible." Paige began pacing. "I haven't even been able to sleep since last night. I have a very important case at work this afternoon with a child abuser, and I can't even concentrate on it because I don't know if I'm going to randomly disappear and then reappear. I can't even be honest with this guy I'm seeing and he's getting worried." She threw herself on her couch. "I still need to call Shane back." She muttered to herself. The three sisters watched as their youngest sister was having an identity crises. Something they were once very familiar with.

Prue walked over and knelt down to Paige's eye level, "Believe it or not, we do know what you're going through." She empathized.

"Doubt it." Paige murmured. She began shaking her head and she groaned in dismay before finally looking up to them, "What am I?"

"A witch." Prue said matter-of-factly.

"Part witch." Leo corrected with bitterness. He hadn't mentioned anything the entire time they were there. Battling within himself whether or not to tell the Elders about Paige was making him completely stressed out.

"Part?" Paige asked. Prue looked back at Leo with slight anger.

Leo met her gaze and opened his mouth, "Yes. Part witch." He annunciated and then began again, "Part. . .demon." Piper swung her arm and hit Leo's. "Ouch!" he yelled.

"Part. . .demon?" even though it was question, it was more of a statement. "What does that even mean?"

"Paige, there is a darkness inside everyone. Yours is more. . .well just more." Prue stayed in eye contact with Paige, hoping to try and keep her composed.

"Does this mean I'm evil?" Paige asked, worried.

"Yeah." Piper responded. Prue and Phoebe quickly shot her a glance.

"NO!" Phoebe responded

"No!" Piper corrected herself, startled.

Paige got up quickly and began shaking her head. "None of this makes sense. I'm not…half witch, half demon. I'm a normal girl. And an only child for that matter. I can't handle this right now. Where is my purse?" She held out her arms, as if gesturing to reach for it, but from across the room her purse began to shimmer with a fiery addition to it, and appeared in her arms moments later, leaving a fiery trace. She dropped the purse quickly and yelled in recoil. "What was that?!"

Prue got up and looked towards Leo, "What was that?"

"Her powers. Remember what Cole said? They would be affected by her disposition and influences." Leo replied. "That must be her more demon side affecting her abilities. Instead of just shimmering, it shimmers with fire."

"But Leo, that doesn't make any sense. Influences? We're witches, and good witches at that, shouldn't her power be more…ya know, good right now then?" Phoebe speculated.

"Not exactly. She could have been in contact with a demon and not have known it." Leo said, which immediately suggested the Source to the sisters.

Piper turned to Paige, "Paige, you should come with us." Paige, who was still shocked over her power development, had her hands placed over her mouth and she was breathing quickly.

"No, I can't. I have work; that little boy." She was muttering to herself. "You guys have to go!" She walked forward towards her bathroom and slammed the door shut. The sisters ran after her but were subdued by the door.

"Want me to blow it up?" Piper suggested.

"Yeah, in an apartment complex, right Piper." Prue said.

"Okay, then why not just. . .ya know, swing it up?"

"Because Paige is right next to it, it could hurt her. Maybe render her unconscious." Prue argued.

"I like that, then we can just take her and she can't say anything about it." Piper snickered.

"No, just. . .hold on." Prue closed her eyes and her body became stiff, falling into a slumber. She could feel her mind projecting through the door and in a space behind Paige. She concentrated on that spot and an astral copy made itself tangible. She opened her eyes and just then, Paige realized Prue was behind her in the mirror. Paige let out a scream of panic and Prue placed her arms on her, trying to calm her down.

"Paige, please just listen to me. Try and calm down. We need you to come with us so we can protect you." Prue tried to reason.

"Protect me from what? Myself?" she spat out.

"No! Something really evil is after you. We need to make sure you're safe." Prue said.

"Paige, it's true, listen to her!" Phoebe called out from behind the door.

"I'm not going with you, no way. I asked you to leave and you didn't, that's called trespassing!" Paige yelled. Prue marveled at Paige's statement. "Now leave before I call the police."

"And tell them what, your half-sister astral projected into your locked bathroom?" Piper called out from behind the door.

"Paige, just. . ." Paige interrupted Prue by opening the door in front of her, and let out a shrill of horror by seeing Prue's body unconscious, yet standing right in front of her. She looked back and saw Prue's astral copy fade away and Prue's body become conscious again.

"I have to go back to work!" She shoved her way through the sisters.

"Piper, can you freeze her?" Prue suggested out of desperation. Piper threw her hands forward to activate her power and nothing happened.

"Nope." She said simply. Paige looked back with a flabbergasted expression on her face at Prue's suggestion.

"I'm leaving. If you guys are still here when I get back, I will call the police on you." She grabbed her purse and slammed her front door shut behind her as she left.

There was an awkward silence.

"Okay. . .so now what?" Phoebe said, letting her arms fall to her sides in defeat. She walked over towards Paige's window and began keeping an eye out for Paige to exit the building.

"I don't know. The source is out there, who knows if he's already found her or not." Leo stated.

"Based on her power display, I'd say you're about right." Prue agreed. "So, what should we do? We can't just follow her. I mean, she can call the police…"

"And we don't want exposure again." Phoebe pointed out.

"Well, do we just go looking for the source, I mean…where would we even start?" Piper slid her hands through her hair and then folded her arms.

Phoebe jumped in place, "We could start there!" she said, quickly moving to Piper's purse and pulled out the sunglasses they had enchanted earlier and slid them on. She looked out the window again and gasped.

"What is it?" Piper asked, taking Prue's hand and walking over to the window. They saw Paige, looking just as frantic as she had when she had stormed out and then a guy with her. He wore a black leather jacket, dark hair; he wasn't much taller than her and based on her body language that must have been her boyfriend; Shane.

"What's is it, Phoebe?" Prue asked, not seeing the problem. She took off her sunglasses and handed them to Piper. Through the dark visors, Shane's true appearance was revealed in the form of a dark, cloaked figure with a fiery red aura around him; as well as Paige. Hers wasn't as large, but it was growing. There was also a veil of darkness around her. The Source was moving fast.

"That's, the – the –the. . ."Phoebe began pointing her fingers, trying to spit out his name.

"I know who it is!" Piper replied with fervor. Prue snatched the glasses and saw it all for herself. They were getting closer to Paige's car. "Leo, we gotta get down there! There is an ally right there, orb us to it!" The sisters ran towards him, he grabbed their hands and they orbed into the abandoned ally which was across the street from where Paige parked her car.

As Paige was getting in, Phoebe yelled after her but she seemed not to hear it. Shane did, however, turning around to face them with his eyes becoming pure black. He threw his arms forward and a red wall of energy surged from his fingers and pushed the sisters and Leo back from the street, to hitting the hard brick walls at the end of the ally.

"What the hell was that?" Piper groaned, getting up and holding the back of her head in pain.

"Okay, okay; he's really strong." Prue said, trying to avoid putting pressure on her right leg as she got up.

"Like we didn't know that already?" Phoebe had a gash in her left arm. Leo, unharmed, quickly held out his hands and healed her. And then healed the others.

Arriving back at the manor the witches weren't exactly thrilled with their obvious failure. Each of them threw their coats onto the floor and traveled up the stairs to their attic. The sisters – and especially Phoebe – were surprised to see Cole there, almost as if he never left. Phoebe leaned upward to kiss him and held onto him; he did the same.

"So, how did it go?" Cole asked.

"It didn't" Piper grunted, walking over to the couch and all but throwing herself on it. "She's definitely part of this family." She crossed her legs, "it sucks."

"What happened?"

"We came, we saw, we didn't quite conquer." Piper said.

"She totally freaked, which I mean is understandable considering we were in her position when that happened but all we had to worry about then was Piper's boyfriend, Jeremy and she has to worry about the Source." Prue sat down next to Piper, "He's got her."

"What? The Source?" Cole stepped back from Phoebe and looked at her. She nodded her head. "What did you do?!"

"Nothing. He got blasted us back a hundred feet into a brick wall before we could get to Paige." Phoebe said.

"You have to get to her fast." Cole said.

"We know, Cole." Phoebe began.

"No, Phoebe. If he's already got her in his sights then he can manipulate her for evil. When a Witch comes into her powers, there is a window that either good or evil can take advantage of. 48 hours. If he can influence her to use her powers for evil, she will become evil." Cole said.

Piper and Prue's eyes widened. "Who makes up these cockamamie rules? " Piper demanded. She looked around with no reply. "Ugh. Nevermind."

"Okay, we have to get to her. Leo, you remember where she works, right?" Prue said, helping Piper up.

"Yeah, but I can't help you." Leo said. All of them stopped and turned to him. Piper walked over to him with her hands in fists.

"Um why is that?!" she yelled. Leo shook his head.

"Look, this is wrong. The Source is after her, we need to tell the Elders that the Source has surfaced, or else something really bad could happen. If not to you then to someone else."

"Leo, no you can't tell them! Paige's life could be in danger if they found out about her." Piper said. "We can't keep having this conversation. Look, you don't have to help us. But if you go to tell them, you can't come back. I don't want you here if you do that." Piper folded her arms and looked down. She looked as though she was trying very hard to remain composed.

"Piper. . ." Leo was completely caught off guard and looked equally distressed.

"No. Are you going to help us?" she waited a few moments in silence and shook her head. She looked back at Phoebe and Prue, water was swelling in her eyes. "Do you know where to find her?" Prue and Phoebe looked equally shocked as Piper was distraught.

"Yeah, I do. A Social Services firm, fifteen minutes away at least." Phoebe said.

"Let's go." Piper stepped across Leo and walked out of the attic without looking at him. Cole, Piper, and Prue followed.

The sisters drove up to the building that Phoebe was referring to and came into an instant shock, stopping the car before even parking. All of them got out. Paige was standing, holding out her right arm towards a man on the ground, in pain. She was very focused. Prue slid on the sunglasses and saw a dark veil with a larger fiery aura around her.

"Oh god!" Phoebe yelped. All four of them surrounded Paige, trying to draw attention away from her. "Paige, what are you doing?!" Phoebe yelled.

"The man is evil." She said with a low echo to her voice. "He's hurting his child. He can't get away with that."

"Paige, you need to stop it!" Prue yelled. She took off her coat and threw it around Paige, breaking her concentration. The agonizing yells of the man ceased. And together the four of them led her to the more abandoned side of the building. Prue then took the coat off of a struggling Paige and the sisters pinned her against the wall.

"Paige calm down!" Prue yelled.

"LET ME GO!" There was still a raw echo in her voice, she continued to struggle, trying to kick her way out of their grasp.

"We need to get her to the manor. Let's hope there is some exorcism in the Book of Shadows 'cause. . .yeah." Piper declared.

"Let her go." A low voice said behind them.

"Shane! Help me get out of here!" Paige yelled. The sisters turned to see the Source in disguise as Shane standing behind them. Cole starred and stepped in front of Phoebe, prepared to protect her.

"You have a lot of guts to stand before me Belthazor." The Source said. "But foolishness won't save them."

"Shane. . .what's going on?" Paige asked, the echo in her voice gone.

"Paige, you have the power to end this. You can get away. Shimmer out." The Source instructed.

"Wha. . .how do you know about that?" Paige stopped struggling and grew confused.

"He's a bad, bad guy Paige! That's how he knows that!" Piper yelled. She threw her arms forward in an attempt to blow him up but he merely waved his arm at her and she flew back. Phoebe ran towards her, helping her up.

"Come to me, Paige." The Source held out his hand. "Come to me, I understand you. I can help you."

"Paige, don't listen to him! Don't!" Prue yelled. Paige began to walk forward. Prue tried to hold her back but Paige finally shimmered out of Prue's grasp with a flaming effect to her shimmer. She was delving into her more demonic side.

"Let's go, Paige. I will take you home." The Source said, with a lecherous grin painted on Shane's face.

"NO!" Prue yelled, grabbing onto Paige just as they shimmered out of the area. Where they arrived, Prue was all too familiar with. The Underworld, the Source's layer to be exact. Prue let go of Paige and looked around.

"What is your problem!" Paige yelled before catching the sight of her surroundings. Horror then struck on her face. The dismal setting, the dark sky, the fire, the smell in the air, all of it made her cringe. "Where are we?"

"We're In the Underworld." Prue said, looking around for the Source who wasn't there. "We need to get out of her Paige." Her eyes were wide.

"What have I done?" She asked.

"Paige, it's okay. We'll worry about that later. Let's try and get through this, alright?" Prue said, taking her hand. "Let's go." Prue dragged Paige forward a bit before finally The Source appeared in a bright flame.

"Going so soon, Paige?" he chastised.

Paige gulped and nodded. "Yes."

"Ah, sorry, I don't think so. Stay; you could be great you know? Fight by my side and all will fear you." The source offered.

"I don't want all to fear me. I just don't wanna get fired!" She spat back. "You lied to me. We are leaving!"

"I don't think so." The Source laughed. "You can try, but even you don't know how to use your powers yet." This fact was true. Prue could feel Paige shaking. The fear – the trauma – was getting to her. "Plus, you'll have to escape my men, which won't happen." He swung his arm sending Prue flying away from Paige and onto the ground yards away, hard. In flashes of red lights, many of his guards appeared before him. "You know what to do." He said, turning away and heading towards his throne.

The six men walked over towards Paige. One of them, the biggest one created an energy ball and readied it to be thrown. Paige, instinctively, held out her hand for it, "Fire ball. . .thing!" She yelled. In a flaming shimmer, the fire ball came into her possession and she threw it back at one of the smaller guards, causing him to explode into ash. The remaining five looked down at the remains and began to back her up into a corner.

"Nice trick, you won't get to do it again though!" one of the guards said.

"Back off of her!" Prue yelled from the distance. She swung her arm sending one of the guards into another and landing on the ground a few feet away. One guard turned towards her and swung his arm to punch her. Prue ducked quickly and delivered a kick to his side and then swung her hand, throwing him farther back than the previous two.

"Prue!" Paige yelled.

"Paige, stay back!" Prue called. The bigger guard came up from the side of her and kicked in the back, sending her flying forward. Prue got up quickly but he was already next to her. She swung her arm but he caught it and twisted it, then punched her in the stomach. She let out a cry of pain and began to sink to the ground.

"You're not done yet are you witch?" he called. Prue tried to stand up but he punched her down again.

"Stop it!" Paige yelled. He punched her again, Prue's eyes were closing, she was passing out. "STOP IT!" she yelled. She looked around for something, anything. "I have to help my her!" her eyes caught sight of a knife attached to the guards belt. "KNIFE!" She yelled. It shimmered to her, without the flames, and she threw it at the guard hitting his neck. He fell back, releasing Prue and he turned into ash. Paige rushed to Prue who was barely awake.

"Prue! Prue!" Paige yelled, leaning down and holding Prue in her arms.

"Paige, get out of here. . ."Prue muttered. "They're coming back." Prue lifted her hand towards the guards she'd knocked away, and they were coming towards them. One of them quickly threw a fireball towards Prue. Paige reacted quickly, extending her arm towards it,

"Fireball!" she yelled. Cascades of light twinkled around the fireball and it went straight towards her, as if the lights were carrying it, rather than shimmering. "Ugh!" She yelled, throwing it back and destroying the guard. The other guard stopped, stunned by this. "What just happened?" Paige said, looked at her hand.

"Paige get out of here!" Prue said, once again.

"No! Not leaving without you!" Paige said. She closed her eyes tight, trying to tell herself to teleport, but nothing happened. "This is all my fault. I should have been more calm and listened to you guys. I got us in this situation. You shouldn't have followed me, Prue!" Paige said. The guard was drawing nearer. She closed her eyes again and desired nothing more than to be at the manor. "Manor" she whispered. And then she felt weird.

She opened her eyes and a cascade of them began floating around her and Prue; golden lights.

"STOP THEM!" The source yelled. Paige could see him getting up from his throne and blasting a bolt of electricity their way. But the lights surrounded them and carried them away. Paige closed her eyes again. When she finally opened them, a familiar voice was heard.

"Oh my god, Prue!" Phoebe yelled. She did it. They were at the manor.

"Oh god, Leo! Leo!" Piper yelled. He didn't come. "Leo, please, come back. We need you! Prue need's you!" Blue and White lights orbed in next to them and Leo appeared, seeing Piper's pain and Prue's unconsciousness and obvious wounds. He knelt down towards her, Paige backed up with Phoebe's arms wrapped around her.

Within moments Prue groaned and opened her eyes; adjusting to the lighting. "What happened? Paige? Is she okay?!" Prue hollered.

"Yes, I'm. . .fine." Paige said, walking over to her.

"Oh, good." Prue was relieved, laying her head back down and taking Paige's hand into her own.

"Thank you, Leo." Piper said. Leo nodded and walked up the stairs, presumably to their bedroom. There was a growing silence. They would need to resolve their issues but this wouldn't be the night. "That was some display of power, Paige. Mind telling me what that was?" Piper said, still looking up the stairs as if Leo was still there.

"What do you mean?" Paige asked. Prue sat up.

"Well, when you shimmered here. . .it was. . .beautiful. Golden lights surrounded you." Phoebe said.

"I don't know, I just felt. . .like I had to get Prue out of there. Nothing was more important." Paige explained. Prue smiled.

"I guess your witch side is showing." Piper smiled.

"I like it." Prue added.

"Me too." Paige said.

That night, Prue, Piper, and Phoebe were standing around the book of Shadows; waiting. Apprehension was growing. A knock on the attic door led Phoebe to open it. It was Paige. Phoebe led her to the center of the attic, outside a circle of candles.

"What's going on?" Paige asked. The sisters smiled.

"You'll see." Prue said. The three of them turned to a specific page in their book and began chanting.

"Here these words, here my cries, spirit on the otherside. Come to me I summon thee, cross now the great divide."

A flow of silver lights illuminated from the ceiling and began swirling around in the center of the circle. A transparent being began to form; their mother. She opened her eyes and saw her; her daughter for the very first time.

Paige was filled with awe. Her eyes filling with tears. "Mom?" she was almost afraid to speak it, if rejection would follow. Patty walked out of the circle and became tangible.

"Paige!" she exclaimed in delight. She rushed forward and gave her daughter a hug, for the first time since she was alive. Paige did the same. Her eyes traveled towards her sisters who were all smiling. This was Paige's family. And for the first time in awhile, she had felt at home.

_(Alright guys. I'm so sorry for the delay. I was put on a serious hold from writing this in awhile. Thank you guys for sticking with me and the story. It will be more consistent, I promise. I hope you're enjoying it thus far. =D!)_


	5. Size Matters

Charmed ReWitched

Season 4 Episode 5

Size Matters

The Halliwell Manor was quiet for the next few days. After the Source's defeat there hadn't been too much demonic activity. Yet the tension in their home was far more stressful than a normal demon problem. Piper and Leo hadn't been communicating. The middle sister awoke to find herself alone many mornings. She was at peace that Leo decided not to tell the Elders about Paige. But she felt as if it was only a matter of time, especially if things kept going on the way they were. Grabbing her blanket close, Piper tried to hold back the tears that having been building from the passing days.

_Knock. Knock._

"Who is it?" Piper asked, even though she was hardly audible. The door opened soon after. Prue, carrying a try of cookies and Phoebe carrying a large cup of milk walked into the room and climbed into bed with her. "Cookies this early?"

"It is never too early for cookies!" Phoebe laughed, handing Piper the biggest one. Piper sat up, wiping the tears from her eyes and took it from Phoebe.

"Thanks." She gave a half smile. Prue placed her arms around her and pulled her close.

"You guys haven't talked yet?" Prue began pulling the strands of hair from Pipers face and placing them behind her ears. Piper shook her head.

"Honey, I'm so sorry." Phoebe laid her head on Pipers lap.

"I just don't know what to do. He's obligated by a greater good to do what's necessary to preserve the good. But at the same time he has an obligation to me and this family. So I know he's morally torn but. . ."

"Piper, we know. And, personally, I think you and Leo will be fine. You've been through so much together; it's obvious he loves you. He wouldn't just throw all of that away." Prue said everything that Piper wanted to hear, but she was very reluctant to believe it.

"But nothing like this has ever happened to us before. If the Elders found out and thought that Leo knew about it from the beginning they could. . ." she didn't finish the sentence, realizing her voice was getting croaky.

"Okay hon just calm down." Prue pulled her closed into her chest and began cradling Piper who was trying with all of her might to not let out all of her repressed feelings. "It'll be okay, it'll all be okay."

Piper's door opened once more and Leo walked into the room, seeing the sisters and more notably taking into account the composure of his wife. Feeling the tension she say anything; just scratched his head nervously.

"Uhh, Prue, Phoebe, Paige is here." Leo said with a bitter tone. "I just orbed in down stairs and she was knocking at the door."

"Oh, okay. Prue, we should go see her." Phoebe said nodding her head to Prue. Prue let Piper go and kissed her on the forehead before getting off of the bed and taking Phoebe's hand, walking out of the room.

"Hi." Leo didn't know what else to say. Piper made a mock sound of dismay and looked away.

"Hi." She repeated in sarcasm.

"Piper…" there was an obvious hurt in his voice. Piper turned and glared.

"What?" she pulled her blanket over and fell back on her pillow, looking up at the ceiling. For another moment, there was an awkward silence. Leo walked over to his side of the and sat down on the edge. He tried to rest his hand on hers but Piper pulled away quickly.

"I don't know what to say, Piper." Leo admitted.

"Well I don't know, maybe you're sorry for almost turning in our half-sister to the elders! Maybe that you're sorry you've been treating me like I'm not your wife, lately."

"Piper, that's not fair. I'm torn. I haven't told the Elders, but yes it is still weighing on me. I made a commitment to helping to preserve the greater good. And not letting them know something like this is very destructive to that commitment." He argued, getting up from the bed.

"Well, you also made a commitment to me! Or does that ring on your finger mean nothing to you!" She sat up and was now glaring, trying to hold back her tears. "Leo, everything happens for a reason; Paige came into our lives for a reason and I seriously doubt that reason was to hand her over to the elders because you're afraid of dealing with the consequences. It's like you've never broken the rules before."

"Piper, it's not the same thing!" Leo yelled.

"It is the same thing! If you didn't break the rules in the first place we wouldn't even be married." She was in tears by now. "Leo, this isn't you…"

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Something isn't right about how you're acting about this. You're usually compassionate, understanding, and helpful in a dark time. This is scary for all of us and you know it would be wonderful if I had my husband there to hold my hand and tell me this is all going to be okay. The fact that Paige is half-witch, half-demon scares the living hell out of me. The fact alone that after only having two sisters growing up, and how having another out of the blue is stressful and mind-blowing and it would wonderful if I had my husband there to support me and help me adjust. But no."

"Piper. . .it's complicated." There was pain in Leo's voice. Piper mouthed complicated and began shaking her head.

"I think you should go." Piper finally said. A look of surprise over took Leo.

"Piper, we need to talk about this." He said, in a low, defeated voice.

"It hurts to talk, Leo. It hurts to . . . breathe. So unless you can think of a way to bring me my husband back, I don't want to talk Leo."

"Piper. . ." he sighed, Piper lay back down and turned on her side. "I love you, Piper." She was still silent and few moments later, he orbed out. And nothing was holding back Piper's tears and pain from unloading.

"Well, I didn't know if I should have called first. . .so I just though, ya know, I'm on my lunch break, so why not come and visit?" Paige felt very indifferent standing in front of Prue and Phoebe. She still didn't know if she belonged there; and the sisters didn't know that either, yet.

"No, don't be silly. You can come here whenever you need to." Phoebe said with a smile, giving Paige a hug. Paige returned it, but she still seemed troubled.

"Is everything alright, though?" Prue asked.

"Yeah, just had a rough day at work already. And this pompous pig was making fun of this really nice guy who is unfortunately suffering from a severe case of acne." But she didn't tell the whole truth. Phoebe and Prue waited for her to continue. "Well. . .I don't know. Do you guys ever just. . .know something's not right?" Prue and Phoebe blinked.

"Ummm, that's really vague, sweetie." Phoebe replied.

"Right, well, there is this house down the street that I've been passing and every time I'd come here and leave and I'd just get this weird…shiver."

"A shiver." Prue replied, slightly confused on how serious to take it.

"Yeah." Paige folded her arms.

"Anything else?" Prue asked.

"Well, there is this really cute guy that lives there but -"

"Ah," Prue stopped Paige, "Hon, if you get a shiver from a guy that's called hormones, not evil." Phoebe nodded in agreement, "Unless it's in Phoebe's case, which is was both." Phoebe's head shot over to her sister and glared. The Cole comment made Prue smile slightly.

"But, I don't feel like it's just an attraction. I mean, now that I'm a. . .whatever you wanna call it, I feel like it could be more than just a feeling." Paige felt slightly offended that her sisters were almost too quick to not believe her.

"Alright, alright. Why don't we got look in the Book of Shadows or. . .something. We can scry, do you have the address?" Phoebe asked.

"I do, uh, what's scrying?" Paige asked.

"Ha, so much to learn." Phoebe laughed, placed her hand around Paige's shoulder and the three of them walked up the stairs to the attic.

Paige's eyes widened as the saw the book on its stand. "What is that? Is it just a book of spells or something?"

Prue looked at Phoebe and they both smiled, "It's much more than that." Phoebe said. She watched as Paige's fingers trimmed the books outer covering. "It has a history of good magic to it. All the witches in our bloodline have contributed to this book." She said, proudly. "It's protected from all kinds of evil."

"Wow. . ." Paige was overwhelmed.

Prue's attention seemed to be elsewhere. "Phoebe, I'm going to go check on Piper." She said, walking out of the attic.

"Here, I should go with you." Phoebe said turning to Paige, "You can look at it for awhile." Phoebe smiled and ran up to Prue who was almost down the stairs. When they got to Pipers room, they found making her bed, dressed, and her eyes severely puffy.

"Paige is here." Phoebe said, trying to ease into conversation. "She thinks she could be onto something." Piper didn't look at them.

"Oh?" she sounded uninterested.

"Yeah, she gets this weird feeling from this house down our street. She seems pretty adamant about it." Phoebe had noticed Piper's lack of interest and Prue began to walk over to her.

"Piper, are you. . .?"

"I'm fine, Prue." She lied. "Now, what's this? A house?" she looked at them and shook her head.

"Unfortunately we're not quite sure. We were going to scry for evil with the address that she had for it, but we wanted to check on you, first."

"Like I said, Prue, I'm fine. So, evil? I think we should maybe try and figure this out." Her dodging of the subject only made Prue and Phoebe worry.

"You see, Piper, we don't know anything about it, nor how serious it is. I mean. . ."

"Hey." Paige said from behind them. They all turned, it wasn't the best time for their new sister to be there and Paige caught on. "Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. But. . . I have to go back to work." She seemed nervous.

"What? Already?" Phoebe exclaimed. "Alright, well, call us when you get off?" Phoebe gave Paige a hug.

"Definitely, bye guys." She began to turn around and then turned back, pulling out a piece of paper, "Oh, here is the address to that place. I didn't want to leave without you guys having it."

"I'll take that, thank you." Piper said, walking between Prue and Phoebe and taking the piece of paper right out of her hands and then charged straight for the attic. Paige smiled nervously and headed down the stairs and moments later, the door closed.

"Okay, today is just…"

"Yeah, I know." Prue finished, "Piper is definitely hiding how she's feeling. We just have to try and make things are stress free for her as we can."

"HUH?!" A shriek of horror came from the attic, it was Piper. Prue took Phoebe's hand and they both ran up to the attic to see Piper frozen in place, starring at the empty book stand. "Evil took the book of shadows, how did evil take the book of shadows!?!" she was frantic.

"Oh no." Phoebe said, placing her hands on her cheeks.

"Oh no, Phoebe? Our magical book is stolen, I don't think 'oh no' quite covers it!" Piper exclaimed. Prue's hands were over her mouth. Phoebe walked up to her,

"Well, Piper. I think that there is, that maybe, Paige borrowed the book of Shadows." A maddening silence followed.

"Wha-what, why, WHY would you think that?!" Piper yelled.

"Prue and I brought her up here and we left her alone with it and then we went to get you." Phoebe tried to explain. Piper looked furious and turned to Prue.

"How could you let this happen? It doesn't leave the house!" Piper yelled.

"We know that, we just didn't have time to let Paige know that." Prue defended.

"Oh great, okay well let's go get it back, then we'll kill her." Piper began to walk to the stairs and Prue turned and swung her arm, closing the door shut. Piper turned, "What is this?"

"Piper, okay, we're worried about you. Try and calm down, relax."

Piper glared at Prue, "You see, I'm getting real tired of people telling me to relax."

"Look, Phoebe and I will go get the book from Paige and you just wait here and calm down." Prue suggested. Piper took in a deep breath and exhaled even harder.

"Fine, I'll wait here and scry. And if I find something, I'll go check it out." Piper said, walking over to the grab the scrying crystal.

"Ummm, I don't think that's a good idea!" Phoebe said.

"I agree, I think you should scry but wait for us before you go anywhere. It's not safe to do this by yourself." Prue said.

"I'll do it if I want to, Prue." She responded defiantly, "And I won't be alone. I'll have Leo come with me."

"Leo?" Phoebe said. Prue was equally baffled by the submission.

"Yeah, he and I worked things out. He'll go with me so if something is there he can orb me out." She lied. She didn't look at the sisters, but they didn't know what to say. If Leo was going to be there, they weren't as worried.

"Well, alright." Prue knew there was no getting through to her, "Phoebe, let's go." Prue opened the door and walked down. Phoebe gave Piper a hug and followed her sister. Piper picked up the scry crystal and began spinning it around the map and surely enough, it dropped.

Nearly an hour later, beating lunch traffic, they managed to get to Paige's social working firm. They parked and the two of them stepped out.

"Do you think that Leo and Piper really worked things out?" Phoebe asked.

"I'm not sure." Prue said. "I've been asking myself that same question before we left. I don't see why Piper would lie about it, but then again, if they did work things out she wouldn't be so upset."

"I don't know what to think of it." Phoebe said. But the conversation was short lived, they stopped in mid-stride noticing Paige, hovered over and all but running out of her work building. Prue and Phoebe ran over to her.

"Paige!" Prue yelled. Paige stopped and had a look of horror on her face. She turned her head as if to go another direction and Prue and Phoebe ran to her. "Hey! Don't you walk away from us missy!" Prue grabbed Paige's shoulder and spun her around, only to be shocked. Her bust was at an unnatural size; a noticeable, unnatural size, and the book was almost unseen, crushed between her left breast and her jacket.

"Whoa. Since when did you become betty boop?" Phoebe asked, unable to take her eyes off of Paige's new deformity.

"I don't know, they just…grew?" Even Paige felt unconvinced at the excuse.

"Oh right, so magic had nothing to do with this." Prue snickered.

"Did you cast any spells?" Phoebe asked, already knowing the answer.

"Well, one," Again, she was unconvincing and finally blurted out the truth, "Or four?"

"Four?" Phoebe repeated in disbelief.

"Let me get this straight, you stole our sacred book so that you could perform magical plastic surgery on yourself?" Prue asked with her hands pressed together in front of her chest; Paige nodded at first and then shook her head, "Paige! That is so personal gain!" Prue scolded.

"What's that?"

"Well you would have known if you stuck around long enough for us to tell you." Phoebe said. "Alright, let's get you back to the manor before anyone else see's you, then we'll fix this." Prue and Phoebe got on both sides of Paige and escorted her back to Prue's car. And after a drive of small talk, fifteen minutes later they arrived back at the manor.

"Piper?" Prue called once they got inside after noticing her car was nowhere to be seen. Prue ran up the stairs and searched in her room, the bathroom; nothing, she wasn't anywhere. Fearing that Piper may have already left despite Prue's best efforts to get back as quick as she could, she walked up to the manor to find the scrying crystal on the map of the city. Prue analyzed where it was at and it didn't make sense, and she thought Piper may have just set the crystal in a different spot when she was done.

She took the crystal in her hands and began to spin it, "Guiding spirits hear my plea, drop again so I may see." She chanted. The crystal pulled down on a spot on the map, her eyes traveled back and forth to the address Paige had written next to the map and to where the crystal actually fell; it was the same place. No doubt, she was already there. A strange combination of emotions began to flow through Prue; anger that Piper went ahead without the power of three; but at the same time, if Prue knew that Piper and Leo weren't going through something, would she have cared if Piper went or not?

"Phoebe!" Prue yelled before quickly turning around and running down the stairs. She slowed down when she came to the stairs end and saw a small alter of candles lit with Phoebe standing next to Paige.

"Are you ready for this?" Phoebe asked.

"As ready as I'll ever be." Paige replied. Phoebe took a folded piece of parchment and torched it with the flame of the candle.

"Guiding spirits hear my plea; annul this magic. Let it be." She chanted.

"Please, let it be." Paige replied with desperate enthusiasm. Paige closed her eyes and then opened them again and her once too tight top now deflated to its usual size. And yet, Paige looked behooved. "Do you think maybe it worked out…too good?" Paige said. Phoebe was thinking the same thing for a moment.

"Piper's gone." Prue chimed in, startling the both of them.

"What?" Phoebe said in worry, "Do you know where?"

"Yeah, she scryed and the crystal was at the address Paige left us." Prue walked around the couch and stood in front of both of them. "She hasn't come back yet, so I'm a little worried."

"Well, she said Leo was with her, right?" Phoebe mentioned, Prue's eyes opened in shock having forgot that.

"Leo!" Prue called. "Leo! LEO!" and within moments, blue and white orbs flickered around until they formed Leo.

"Hey, what's up?" Leo said. Prue and Phoebe looked at each other, noticing Leo's clueless disposition, and became extremely worried.

"Ummm, you weren't with Piper were you." Though it sounded like a question, it was more of a statement.

"No?" With that, Prue and Phoebe immediately walked over to the coat rack and reached for their coats. "What's wrong?" Paige seemed equally confused as Leo.

"Piper went to go investigate that house Paige felt might have an evil presence and she hasn't come back yet. She said she'd be with you." Prue said. Leo stopped; a glaze came over his eyes.

"We have to go get her. Paige, c'mon!" Phoebe demanded and Paige quickly followed. "Leo, are you coming?" He didn't move, or make a sound. Phoebe took it as a no and closed the door behind her, Paige, and Prue.

"Look, her car is parked right there." Phoebe pointed out as Prue pulled up across the street from the house. It looked extremely tore down, even almost condemned. Yet, there was a motorcycle in the driveway. Why anyone would still be living there was beyond them. "What should we do?"

"I don't know. I mean, we can't exactly bust in…" Prue sighed. They needed to get in, Piper's car was evidence enough that she was somewhere around. And the fact that she hadn't made herself known meant that something had happened to her.

"I could go." Paige chimed. Prue and Phoebe turned in their seats starred at their youngest, marveling at her suggestion.

"No." Prue said almost instantly.

"Why not? I mean, okay, that guy who lives there, as I told you I think he's really cute and maybe I could lure him out of the house that way you guys can go and see if Piper is alright." Phoebe looked at Prue.

"She has a point." Phoebe said. Prue knew she was right, but didn't want to let Paige go on her own. There could be unforeseen danger. But, there wasn't much other choice.

"Alright. You do not go inside, you take him back to your loft and you wait for us to meet you there, do you got that?" Prue ordered.

"Chill, I got it." Paige opened the door and walked out. She pulled out a lollipop of her pocket and began to open it.

"What is that for?" Phoebe asked.

Paige shrugged her shoulders, "It's for a lure." She smiled and turned away.

"You gotta admit, she's definitely a Halliwell." Phoebe said. Prue remained silent.

Prue and Phoebe were forced to watch their younger sister do what they couldn't. They only hoped they weren't sending Paige off to the wolves. Prue made her instructions very simple; to go back to Paige's loft and wait for them there. And though the guy seemed innocent enough, his disaster of a house that should be otherwise condemned spoke for itself. Prue and Phoebe lowered their bodies in their seats to remain unseen while Paige got on the back of his motorcycle and they took off.

Prue and Phoebe got out of the car and ran up the creaky steps and to the door. Prue jiggled the handle to find that it was locked. She raised her hand to swing it only to have it grabbed and pulled down by Phoebe, "Uhh, what are you doing?"

"What do you think I'm doing? I'm going to open it." Prue said matter-of-factly.

"But what if there is anyone else in there?" Phoebe argued. Prue shook her head and flicked her hand at the doorknob. It turned and opened quietly.

"Well look at that. It's open." Prue smirked, and barged in. The sisters looked around and were struck with horror, if the outside was bad...the inside was on a whole other level of mess. Together they traveled through the first hallway to find something...dark, sinister. A collection of ceramic dolls that had disfigured bodies and especially their heads.

"What a strange collection." Phoebe said.

"Yeah…strange is the word." Prue agreed.

"We gotta find Piper."

"Alright, you look upstairs, I'll look down here." Prue instructed. Phoebe nodded and slowly crept up the decayed wooden steps to the second floor.

Prue followed the hallway down and found dirty plates on dusty night stands. Some furniture, a broken TV. It had evidence that someone lived there, but what kind of person? And worst of all, there was no Piper. And even though the house seemed evidently empty, Prue had an unsettling feeling that someone was watching her. She turned back to the main hallway to find Phoebe coming down the stairs.

"Anything? Any signs of Piper?" Prue asked, hopeful.

"No, nothing. But I have a bad feeling in here Prue. We have to find Paige." she said.

"We still have to find Piper. I think Paige was right, there is something going on in here...and we might need the power of three to stop it." Prue said. "Let's go find her." Prue took Phoebe's hand and the two of them all but ran out of the house and back to Prue's car. Minutes later, they were at Paige's apartment complex.

Phoebe grew worried about Paige once she wasn't picking up her phone. The elevator didn't get to her floor fast enough and when it opened, they ran down the hall and stopped in front of Paige's door. Prue swung her hand and the door flew open, hitting the wall adjacent from it. The two sister's walked in to find the man, standing with his shirt up and Paige sitting on her bed, with her face in a very questionable area. The sister's eyes widened in shock.

"Paige!" Phoebe yelled in an accusing voice. Paige leaned over to find her sisters and rolled her eyes, reassuring them nothing was happening.

"Get a grip, jeeze." Paige said, standing up.

"Well, what were you doing?" Prue asked, raising her right eyebrow.

"Prue...Phoebe...this is Finn." She looked down again at Finn's exposed stomach and waved her hands gesturing for her sisters to come over there. "You have to see this." She turned him around and revealed that he didn't have a belly button. Prue and Phoebe looked at each other.

"How is that possible?" Prue asked.

"Because...I'm not human. Someone made me..." Finn said.

"Who?" Phoebe asked.

"Gammill." He said.

"Okay, talk to us as if we have no idea who Gammill is." Prue suggested, shaking her head.

"He's a doll maker…I'm his…lure. He makes me take innocent girls and lead them into the house where he shrinks them…batters them in clay and then puts them in the kiln for his collection."

"Oh god. All those dolls." Prue said with horror, looking at Phoebe. "Come on, we gotta get to the Book of Shadows. See if there is anything in there about vanquishing him."

Once they arrived at the manor, Phoebe and Paige took Finn to the dining room area while Prue ran upstairs to the attic to fetch the Book of Shadows. Paige had a very intense look on her face; angry.

"Paige, are you alright?" Phoebe asked.

"No, Phoebe. It's my fault Piper got in this mess." She said. Phoebe shook her head, but Paige dismissed it, "If it weren't for me and my stupid suspicion she might have not gone on her own."

"But without your suspicion, someone else could have gotten hurt. It's good that we're stopping this while we can."

"Damn it, Phoebe. That's not it. It's just, ever since I came into this family, I've only added stress to your guys' life. And if he hurts Piper…I'll never forgive myself." She said. Prue came back down the stairs and set the book on the table. "Oh good, let's see if we can find anything." Paige said reaching for the book. However, a red light came out from under her hands and the book slid away quickly.

Prue and Phoebe looked at Paige in confusion. Paige was also at a loss for words.

"What was that?" Paige asked. She tried to reach for it again and the book moved down farther.

"The book doesn't want you to touch it." Prue said.

"It can do that?" Paige asked.

"When it feels threatened…by evil." Phoebe answered. "But that doesn't make any sense, Paige had the book earlier today. Do you think there is something wrong with the book?"

"It's not the book, Phoebe, it's Paige." Prue said. "Remember how Paige's power changed? From fire, like the source, to bright lights? I think the book responds to which part of her is being more dominant. Phoebe looked at Paige. Even though she was confused, she did look very angry as well. Her posture was tense as if she was ready to hurt someone. "The book would have to sense the more dominant good side of her to touch it."

"Wait, you think?" Phoebe asked, reluctant to believe it.

"Oh good. I'm defected." Paige scowled.

"No! Not defected. Just different. We'll help you get through this, don't worry." Phoebe put her arms around Paige and set her down on a chair.

Prue waved her hand at the Book of Shadows, sliding it over to her. She waved her fingers and it flipped open, and the pages began to turn. She kept turning the pages until finally she found him, Gammill. "Found him." She said. Phoebe began to walk over and turned to point a finger at Paige.

"Stay." Phoebe said, Paige rolled her eyes, and Phoebe arrived at Prue's side.

"Well, it doesn't show a vanquishing potion or spell, so maybe our individual powers would be enough but," she paused, "oh god. Once the dolls go into the kiln, there is no return for them."

"Which means your sister is in a lot of trouble." Finn said, coming in from the other room. "I think you should….AHHHHHHHHHH." A bolt of lightning struck him and like a pot falling and breaking, he was gone in a cloud of smoke. Prue and Phoebe stood up and Paige turned. Gammill appeared out of the cloud puff that was left of Finn and fired three bolts of electricity at the sisters that shrunk them down to five inches in height.

By the time Prue became conscious, she became very aware that she could move. In fact, all of her limbs were stiff. As she struggled to open her eyes she used her peripherals to see Piper, Phoebe, and Paige were all on her left side. It was ironic that she set them in accordance to age. She struggled to pulled her lips open and gasped for air. She whispered, "Piper, Phoebe, Paige…can you hear me?"

"Yes." Phoebe and Paige said in unison. Piper grunted really irritably. The clay around her body must have been fully dried.

"Okay, good. We have to get out of here." Prue said.

"Wonderful observation, Prue. How the hell do we do that?" Paige mocked.

"We could call Leo?" Phoebe suggested. "Would he even hear us?"

"No, No!" Piper forced her lips open with a small gasp. "We're calling on him. We'll figure something else out."

"Just saying…" Phoebe said.

"I'm just saying! We won't reduce ourselves to that!" Piper was tempered.

"Someone needs counseling." Paige muttered.

"Who said that? Was that Paige?!" she said. "You're lucky I can't turn my head towards you!"

" Yeah – Not helping." Prue remained silent once Gammill came into view, lighting the kiln. Piper made a horrific squeal. "Alright, alright. We'll figure this out." Prue said.

"Prue, do you think you can astral out of your body? Then you could free yourself, and then free us." Phoebe suggested.

"Worth a shot." Prue closed her eyes and concentrated on the open space to her right. It was narrow, but enough to get by. She felt her mind leaving her body, which put it into a slumber. In a pink flash, her subconscious manifested into a solid state. She knelt down and back up against the wall, making sure she was unnoticed. She burrowed behind her sleeping body and delivered a punch, causing the clay to crumble and fall. She let her mind travel back into her body and her eyes burst open.

She waved her arm at Piper, Phoebe, and Paige and set them free, pulling their bodies out of their clay molds. Piper was losing balance and taking in deep breaths of air.

"About damn time." She said, striking a look at Prue. "If I knew it was going to take you guys to get kidnapped to find me, I would have sold you guys out hours ago."

Prue glared back and turned towards Gammill. "Okay, how are we going to get out of here…or down from here. We don't want him to turn us into one of his…dolls."

"What about that thing he zapped us with. His wand?" Paige suggested. "Right there." She pointed to a table that might as well have been miles away from them.

"Prue, can you lift it over to us?" Phoebe said.

Prue lifted her hand and sent her mind towards it, which caused it to move a bit, but she couldn't lift it. "Are you kidding me? That's got to weigh like what, three pounds?" she cursed.

"What about Paige?" Phoebe suggested.

"What?" Paige replied, stunned.

"What are you talking about Phoebe?" Piper asked.

"Paige can call things to her. We've seen her do it. Maybe she can call the wand to us. There has to be a reverse effect on that wand." Phoebe turned to Paige, "Paige, you have to try."

"And try to use your witch half. It might work better." Prue instructed.

"What?" Piper whispered to Prue.

"I'll explain later." Prue reassured her. Paige held out her arms towards the wand and concentrated. She knew what she wanted, but she didn't know if she was strong enough to summon it. She did have her sisters that counted on her. And she would have to hurry, because Gammill could turn around any moment to grab them.

"Wand." She whispered. Nothing happened.

"Paige, you might have to be a little louder." Phoebe said.

"But Gammill…"

"Just do it, Paige." Piper yelled.

"WAND!" Paige yelled. In a cascade of brilliant white lights, the wand traveled across the room and into Paige's hand. Gammill turned to find his wand was gone and his gaze was switched to the sisters.

"NO!" he yelled in protest.

"Uhhh, aim it at him." Prue instructed, quickly and frantic.

Phoebe helped Paige sturdy the wand and pointed at him. "We don't have a clear shot, and it looks like it needs a jolt to start." Phoebe said.

"Piper." Prue gestured.

"On it!" Piper threw her hands forward and an explosion occurred inside the back of the wand, which fired a bolt of electricity. Gammill saw it and moved out of the way.

"It missed!" Paige yelled.

"Like hell." Prue waved her arm at the bolt of electricity before it hit the wall on the other side of the room and sent it back, hitting Gammill from behind, shrinking him down to their size.

"Uh oh." He chirped from the ground below. From their ledge, the sisters looked down at him, who was trying to run. Piper threw her hands at him, freezing him in place.

"Well now, what do we do?" Paige asked.

"Well, we could say a spell, I mean; one of us was immobilized all day. I'm sure someone has one ready." Prue mocked towards Piper.

"I'm sorry? Yes. I was immobile trying to preserve the greater good. Excuse me for not having a rhymed couplet ready." She snickered.

"It's alright, I have one." Phoebe said. "I got to thinking ahead of time. Just…follow me." She cleared her throat, and Paige stepped back, letting the Power of Three take over. "Small of mind."

"Small of mind."

"Big of woe."

"Big of woe."

"The pain you caused."

"The pain you caused."

"You now will know."

"You now will know." The three of them said together in unison, causing a flame circle to surround gammill and cast him aflame, turning him into ash. His vainquish provoked the wands magic to be useless and the girls began to regain their height. All of them falling on top of each other with a thud.

"Ouch…" Paige, said, being on the bottom. "This is the last time I'm wearing good jeans when I'm around you guys." She muttered. Prue, Piper and Phoebe laughed.

"You'll learn." Prue said.

That night at the Halliwell manor, it was very quiet. Paige had gone home and the sisters had spent most of the evening in the bathrooms, getting clay and dirt off of their bodies and out of their hair. They would have to attack the laundry the next day. That would require a different kind of strength.

Piper sat alone on the couch in the living room. Prue and Phoebe walked in there with a platter of cookies and a glass of milk for each of them and sat down next to her.

"Thanks." Piper said after Phoebe handed her glass to her.

"Are you alright?" Prue asked.

"Yeah." She hesitated. "No, not at all."

"Still haven't talked to Leo?" Phoebe asked.

"Yeah, that would require that he cared."

"Piper…I think he still cares." Prue began.

"Maybe. But clearly not enough. He wants to turn our sister over to the Elders. And he's afraid he doesn't than we'll all be hurt by association."

"Maybe he's right." Phoebe said.

"Wait, you agree with him?" Piper accused.

"Well, no. I mean, he's probably right that we could be hurt by association. But I don't think he's right to abandon his family because of it." She clarified.

"Me either." Prue agreed.

"This whole thing has just gotten so…" she couldn't finish the sentence. Tears were swelling behind her eyes. "Don't get me wrong, Paige coming into our lives has messed a lot of things up. But she's still our sister. And I'm going to do what I can to protect her. And I know the risk. I know that neither side of Good nor Evil want her to exist. And it's a lot of stress…and it's a lot. And at the end of the day, I don't want a whitelighter who's worried about what could happen. I just want my husband."

Both Prue and Phoebe placed their hands on Piper's and tried to comfort her.

In a cascade of blue and white lights, Leo appeared in the front room, his eyes heavy with pain and sorrow. Clearly, his and Pipers fight had been weighing on him all day as well. "Can I talk to Piper…alone." He said. With the sadness in his voice, Prue and Phoebe thought it best for them to work it out. Prue nodded her head. She leaned over and kissed Piper on the forehead. Phoebe followed her example and the two sisters walked out of the room and up the stairs.

"Leo, if you've come here to try and change my mind, then forget it. We're not giving up on Paige."

There was a slight bit of disappointment in his face. "Piper, I know." He said. Piper became taken back by that response. "Look, I love you Piper. I meant all of those vows on our wedding. For better and for worse. I can't say that I'm supportive of not telling the elders about Paige…but I can't not be with your either. I have to be with you. Otherwise…I can't breathe Piper. I can't."

"Leo, I want to be with you too. But this is our family. And for you to even second guess the importance of our family and how screwed up it might be was a big slap in the face. When it all got tough, you just ran away."

"Damn it Piper! I wasn't running away. There is a lot to consider here. You don't know what they could do to me, to us, if they found out about this. And we never came forward. Is that what you want, Piper? Do you want us to be torn apart?"

Piper folded her arms and got up from the couch. "Leo, look at us now. We're torn apart. Whether we came forward, or we didn't…the result is still the same with us right now. So what's the point? At least we can give Paige a fighting chance. She didn't ask for any of this."

Leo was at a loss for words. Piper shook her head. "I'm going to bed. It's been a long day. Why don't you sleep down here tonight." She said, turning her back.

"Piper…"

"Leo…don't. You've seemed to have made your choice. I love you. But I can't deal with this. When you stay and be a husband and a brother in law to the family, then come talk to me." Piper walked up the stairs after a moment of silence. Leo watched his wife walk up to their bedroom without him.

(Alright everyone. I apologize again for this taking so long. Thank you all for being incredibly patient with me. I really hate making you guys wait. I wrote this one twice already because I accidentally deleted once and forgot to save the other. So...Yeah. I'm trying to get episodes six, seven, and eight done by the end of the month. This is I do promise. I have a lot of exciting things to add to this, so I hope you all like them too. =D. If you guys also have any questions or any particular things you would like to see from the actual Season 4 let me know. I always love input and ideas.)


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